The Urgency of Life
by subaruxkamui4ever
Summary: SetoJoey. Addiction threatens to take Joey from Seto forever, who will stop at nothing to keep him alive. But Seto needs to be rescued from his own desires as well, and Joey finds that neither boy may live. COMPLETE...ly depressing, heh
1. falling

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever 

Before I get into this I will issue – **the warning** - . Seriously, this fic is not for the kiddies. Rated R for _serious angst, yaoi, and extremely explicit drug use and abuse, possible character death/suicide, self-inflicted injury, and mutilation of others with/without consent._ I shouldn't be writing this at all, actually. I'm right in the middle of my other fic, Clear Vision, but this has been stuck in my head for some time now, so it's time to let it out. Rest assured I will be updating C.V. very soon. This story will be much shorter, and much more desperate and sad. Do not expect a happy ending from this one, although I won't promise anything as of yet. Once again, I'll be Joey, because just thinking about trying to get inside Seto's head gives me the creeps. Can you just imagine what goes on in there? No, thank you.

falling. .. . .. ..... . ..

I'm in love with him. I wonder if he knows? He couldn't possibly. I certainly don't act like I love him. I treat him as harshly and without feeling as I possibly can. I must. How else can I survive? It is much better this way, this game that we play, back and forth, tossing hatred and loathing across our schoolroom, our dueling arena, wherever we happen to be together. This is the only way I can think of to make you show me that you care about my existence. You notice me, because you hate me so much. You don't even have a moment to spare on thinking about hating anyone else, yet you spare the time for me. I've come a long way, apparently.

I was staring at my ceiling for a long time that night, thinking about Seto Kaiba. I suppose it sounds strange, but it's true. I do it all the time, have done it, for a long time. I'm in love with him. I say that to myself a lot. I like the way it sounds. I've heard the phrase numerous times, from the people around me, the shows on TV, you can hear it anywhere you go. It's not a very interesting phrase at all. It's commonplace, boring, and even irritating at times. Until you say it to yourself. I'm in love with him. I closed my eyes and said it with my voice.

"I'm in love with him."

It sounded gorgeous, and I loved the way the words felt on my tongue. I decided, a long time ago, that this feeling would have to be enough. He would never feel for me the way I do for him, for while my hatred was a mask, his was true and real. It would have to be enough. I didn't ever allow myself to imagine what life would be like if things had been different, if he had been in love with me as well. I rarely even let the thought cross my mind. It had no purpose in my life, these false hopes. Just loving him was enough. My feelings were all I had here in this place I lived, and I clung to them violently. If this was as much as I would get, I would do anything to keep it safe. These feelings were my life's work, my only ambition, my one source of energy and will to survive. Without them, I was lost. I was nothing. I couldn't imagine what my life would be reduced to if these feelings were stolen from me. I wouldn't want to imagine. The framework of my existence had already been slowly withering and fading from the inside out, due to my...problem. My feelings were keeping my head above water, so to speak. Without them, the entire foundation would crumble upon itself, leaving my spirit a shattered mess, never to be repaired. This was why I thought about him, as I stared at my ceiling, my eyes glazed, and seemingly empty. He was all I had.

Every night I laid there, on my floor, not owning enough energy pull myself up. I didn't even really mind it. After the events of the day, it always felt good. Now I was home. No matter who lived there or what they did to me, I didn't have to put on any shows here. In this place, I could be my true self. I could take my mask off and rest from the constant burden of wearing it for everyone else. There were no friends to save me from myself here, I could drown in whatever I chose to, no one would stop me, no one would care. No one would know. Everyone else here was here for the reason. The reason I was here, still came back, after all that's happened. We didn't care anymore. We don't see each other very often. When we do, we keep to ourselves. Titles such as "Father" or "Child" no longer exist between us. We mind our own business.

I often became lost in my own thoughts. Even now, as I try to recount the events as they happened, I begin to ramble, become one with the past as though I am there now. But the things I did then, and the things I do now, are very different. I begin with this day in particular, not because the day itself was particular. Far from the truth. In fact, this day was, moment for moment, almost identical to every day that came before it, for a very long time. The day exactly following, however, was the first twirling snowflake that eventually became the torrential avalanche, and destroyed everything in its path and wake. That is where these things begin to move, and these events unfold.

falling. . .. . . .

I opened my eyes, and immediately felt the air in them, burning, as though they'd been open all night. It wasn't far from the truth. I slept rarely, and when I was able to fall, my eyes would sometimes stay open of their own accord, glazed and blindly staring straight through absolutely nothing. Turning my head, I looked at the clock that sat near my sleeping place, on my desk, the only piece of furniture in the room, if it could be called that. 6:06 am. 'I need to get ready now if I want to have time to wake up before I leave', I thought to myself, knowing what I meant in my own way of speaking. I rolled over slowly and sat up on the floor, where I slept, in a pile of blankets and clothes used for both covers and pillows. Digging through the mess, I found my blue uniform and tossed it to the side of the room, now distinguishable from the pile. I went to the bathroom and brushed my teeth for a long time. I always brush for at least a couple of minutes. There's a constant taste in my mouth, but still, I try to rid myself of it, even for just a moment. It's a bad taste. Everything begins to taste that way after awhile. I rinsed out my mouth and wiped my face off with a towel. I'm finished in the bathroom. On my way out, I looked at the shower and a thought crossed my mind. 'When was the last time I took a shower?' I couldn't remember. It couldn't have been more than a week, though. I never seemed to have time for things like that. Everything was pushed back and forth in order of importance, until my priorities found their way to the front of the line.

Back in my own room, I slipped out of the sweats I had worn to bed and pulled on the uniform I had cast aside. Just out of curiosity, I glanced in the mirror that hung above my desk. Looking at him, he looked right back, and I saw him and the way he felt, for he showed it clearly through his demeanor. He was very, very tired. His eyes were rimmed in red, not even a pink, but a dark red that reflected the tenderness and mistreatment of the skin there. The circles under his eyes weren't all that bad, but he had never been prone to them, so they were easier to miss. However, above his eyes, scattered along the top of his eyebrows, he had broken out, and tiny, irritated blemishes sat and refused to go away no matter how feverishly he scrubbed at them. Looking still at him, I thought about what I looked like to my friends. I wondered if they would notice, perhaps if they already had. If I could see it...well there was no use worrying about it. I looked how I looked and could always just tell them I was sick again. It seemed like I was sick a lot...I chuckled to myself at the thought, even though it wasn't really all that funny. It was an inside joke, and even though I was the only one in on it, It was still funny to me. Or maybe I was tired. I couldn't remember. I knew my body was exhausted, but I couldn't tell if I was actually tired. Either way, I needed to get ready for school. Now that I was all set to go, I had to get ready. There is a huge difference between being set to go and being ready. Sitting down at my desk, I opened the top drawer to my right and pulled out everything I kept in the back corner, tucked in an empty cigarette box. Flipping the lid open, I pulled out a blade, which was beginning to dull, a piece of a straw from a fast food restaurant cut at an angle, and a corner of a sandwich bag tied off in a loose knot, containing the precious substance that fueled my body through each day. I undid the knot at the top of the sack, and gingerly reached in with the blade and collected an amount on the tip. Carefully I brought it over to the CD that sat on my desk, flipped over to the mirrored side, and dumped it in a pile. Tapping the blade twice to the disc to cast off any powder that had stuck, I retied the knot on the bag and stuck it back into the box. Placing the straw near the disc so it wouldn't roll away, I began the tedious but strangely calming process of cutting. Taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptap.......My mind always wandered at the repetitive noise....taptaptaptaptaptaptap.........I thought of him.......and smiled.

After a few minutes, the rocks all seemed to be gone, and what was left was a smooth pile of silky white powder, cut so fine it almost stuck to itself. I hoped it would be enough for the day because I couldn't exactly find the time or the atmosphere at my high school to do this again. I could make it with what I had, I was sure of it. I didn't have the constant, gnawing feeling in the back of my brain that came when I knew I would run out soon, and have to buy more. What I had left in the drawer would take me to the end of the month, if not a little farther. I would be fine. And no one would ever know. It was partially for them, the people I didn't want to find out. They expected Joey to act like they had built him up to act, and I had to play that part. I owed them a lot more than just that. I'm not in any way going to say that I began this game for them, because I didn't. I just found a way to ease the burden of being who I was supposed to be. Who I really was sort of, well, got in the way. I could be what everyone wanted me to be, what I secretly _wanted_ me to be. What I would have been if...things hadn't been so hard, so early on. But most importantly, with this game, I found that I could be the person that Seto hated. Everything that I would normally be far too frightened to say to him, it all just came out, with a little help. I had the nerve, the spark, the audacity that drove him over the edge. I needed that, more than life. I needed him to react to me. And react he did.

I separated the pile into four uniform lines with the corner of the blade, each one almost perfectly unison with the next in both height and width, still leaving half of the original amount to take with me. I had become quite good over the past few months. It didn't begin at four, however. Not even close. This had been going on for about eight or nine months now. At first it was just a weekend thing, something that everyone in my neighborhood did anyway, and was widely accepted for a few blocks around as a perfectly decent "weekend" activity. After a few weeks, I realized that the time I spent 'off' was mostly directed at hurrying towards the time I spent 'on'. Partly because the 'off' time was becoming a blurry mess. It took me a long time to scrape up the nerve to take the stuff to school with me, but I realized that my chances of being discovered were becoming greater while I was 'off'. No one suspected a thing while I was 'on' because I slowly began to need to _be _'on' in order to act the way I used to when I was always 'off'. It's confusing, but essentially, I was more noticeable when I was 'off', so the decision was made, and I made it a daily habit. Which took my capacity for volume to amazing heights. What used to keep me awake for days would now only keep me awake till lunch. But I wouldn't complain. This was my life, my game, and none of it really mattered to me. I thought of nothing but him. Constantly, endlessly, obsessively, nothing and no one could break my attention or my devotion. Each time we got into a standoff, I ran my mouth louder and more aggressively, hoping to perhaps spark a new level of hatred and, inevitably, feeling, which Seto had never felt before. For anyone. And I kept on this way, and things did not progress, until this day, which I recount to you now.

I leaned over the disc, one hand holding the straw thrust up my nose, the other hand pressed against the other side of my nose, closing the passageway so I couldn't draw any air through it. Lining up the tip of the straw with the beginning of the first line, I sharply drew air through my one nostril, and the powder traveled up into brain. One....two...three..........four! After taking up the last line, I dropped the straw and threw my head back, freezing in that moment. The moment where it all begins. The burning sensation began, the one that told me that all the vessels in my sinuses were doing their best to carry the substance into my system. It burned, but...it felt so _good._ Then, a few moments later, the mucous came. This was by far the worst part. It left such an awful taste in the back of my throat, so much that I still retch even today. Grabbing a can of soda from under my chair, I snapped it open and took a huge drink, swallowing slowly to make sure it carried some of the taste with it. I always kept a ton of soda around, it's the only way to pass it down and kill the taste at the same time. God, it tastes so awful, but afterwards, when the feeling kicks in, I feel as though I could do a thousand things at once. I feel so good that I'm alive and here, and everything is right with the world. I feel contentment with life that I couldn't reach before.

Now, I was 'ready to go'. And after the whole process was complete, it was time for me to leave for school. Not that I would be able to pay any sort of attention when I got there. I can't sit still. I get nervous, fidgety, even rambunctious when I'm 'on'. My speech speeds up tremendously as well, and the words tend to run together, slurring into what sounds almost like an accent. Feeling more than rejuvenated, I grabbed my backpack, stuck the cigarette box in my pocket, and ran out the door.

AN: I'm gonna break for a chapter here, but its not that much longer. Well...crap...maybe it'll be longer than I thought. Damn! I seriously thought I would make this two, maybe three chapters, maybe! Well, I'll get both stories out, swear. I like both of them far too much to leave them unfinished, and anyway, there's nothing I hate more than an unfinished story. Well.....maybe silentshipping. You guys, It seriously pisses me off! I swear, the untamed anger....


	2. falling 20

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

So, remember to not do drugs...right? Well, this story isn't starting out that sad, but it will get sadder. Trust me. And then later, it will get sadder. Really. And so on and so forth. Now this is where Seto comes in and tries to rescue his puppy from himself! Oh, it's so _romantic_! But then, later, it will get sadder....

falling..... . . .. . . . . . .

"Jo....Joey! Joey, you nose! It's..."

The teacher stared at my face and pointed to the door. "Quick, go to the nurses office! Your nose is bleeding." As she attempted to regain control of the classroom, in which the air had become heavy with whispers, it finally dawned on me and I put a finger to my lip. Blood trickled slowly out of my nose, and trailed down my face, running rivulets over my lips and tingeing my tongue with a metallic taste. I was not as shocked as I'm sure everyone thought I should be, but I was not quite in my right mind. I laughed as I gazed at my hand, looking at my red fingertips. There wasn't really that much, I just wasn't sure how I had done it. I mean, I had a pretty good idea, but I had done everything like normal. What had gone wrong? Or maybe this was supposed to happen every once in awhile. It had been almost a year, but that wasn't very long to have an addiction. There were plenty of things I had yet to experience, I was sure. And since I was actually 'on' while this was happening, I found it to be quite exciting.

"Joey, are you OK?" I looked up to see who had called my name. The teacher, who had sent me to the nurse a minute earlier, was curious to know why I hadn't gone. I was momentarily glad that I looked worse than I felt, I could pass off my strange behavior as dizziness, or something related. I decided to play along with it. "No, I feel...sick. I can't go alone..." I played my hand, hoping she'd ask one of my friends to take me. Then we'd have a chance to get out of class for awhile. I hated sitting for very long. "Can someone come with me?" I pleaded, halfway shutting my eyelids so they drooped and made me look tired. I still had plenty of blood on my face, so I'm sure I looked pitiful either way, but everything I did in this state of mind was over-exaggerated. The teacher looked carefully around the room before settling slightly on a face and then returning to her text.

"Seto, will you please escort Joey to the nurse?"

Oh. That wasn't what I had meant at all.

No. This was bad.

Not him. I couldn't be alone with him.

Not now.

Not today.

Not ever.

I was in love with him.

falling.. . . . . .... ..

He was silent as he stood abruptly from his desk and turned to face me, giving me a look of cool indifference, regardless of how sick I looked. "If I must..." he returned. Walking towards the door, he passed me completely without pausing for a second and turned the handle, swinging it open. "Come on mutt," he said deeply, and smirked. "Let's take you to the vet." The class loved it, and laughed hysterically as I rushed past them, desperate to be away from them. I knew my face had probably gone red by then, and I was afraid someone would notice. He had smiled at me...and I almost couldn't handle it. True, it was more of a calculated grimace than a smile, but it was more than enough to drive me crazy. As I walked out of the classroom, he let the door close behind us and began walking down the hall, not bothering to see if I was following him or not. "Hey, wait!" I said, trying not to yell, since there were classes in session all around us. He didn't, nor did he show that he had heard me call to him. I ran and caught up to him quickly. "Hey, Kaiba, this isn't even the right wa-"I was cut short as he abruptly stopped and grabbed me by the collar, pulling me in the direction he had turned in so suddenly. Opening a door, he tossed me casually inside and followed me in. The door shut itself behind us. Looking all around me, I realized that I was in an empty classroom, alone, with Seto.

Alone.

Still half sitting, half-lying on my back, I watched him as he opened his briefcase, which I had failed to notice him grab earlier. Sitting at one of the empty desks, he pulled a laptop out of his bag and turned it on, apparently preparing to work on something. It was as if I had never happened. I needed his attention desperately, but I couldn't just start insulting him out of nowhere. I'd look insane. Instead, I got off the ground and approached him cautiously, coming around the desk to stand behind him. "Whatcha doin'?" I asked casually.

"Working." He replied, in a way that halted the rest of the words that were about to leave my lips. I caught my breath in my throat, this was exactly what I couldn't stand! Hate me, Love me, feel anything for me, but don't feel nothing at all! I exist, and I will make sure that I exist to you as well, if it's the last thing I ever do! I looked at his face for a full minute, watching him work. He became frozen, stilled to perfection when he worked, the only movement at all were his fingers, flying across the keypad, almost too fast to see. The light from the small screen shone across his face, lighting his already unnaturally blue eyes with a bright silver sheen that made them glow almost like those of a demon. His features were so small and delicate, when you saw them close up. It was surprising, because when one thought about Seto Kaiba, one did not think of the words _small_ and/or _delicate_ to describe anything about him. But he really was. I was thinking a mile a minute, and being in such close proximity to him, accompanied by my altered state, caused me to completely forget that when I spoke,my voice could be heard. Because I was so used to saying it over and over again, whenever I thought about him like that, it came out naturally. I didn't even think, it just came out. It was so quiet, spoken under my breath, almost in awe of his presence.

"I'm in love with him...." I looked past him, behind him, and my focus blurred. It had been a few hours since I'd had more, and it was well past the time I normally did it. Seto, on the other hand, had stopped what he had been doing and looked up into my face. "What did you say?" He asked, and there was no underlying tones in his voice whatsoever. His face held confusion, and he stared directly into my eyes, waiting for me to answer. Seeing him like that brought me back from my momentary daze, and I realized that I had said that phrase aloud. I panicked, but tried not to show it, willing my voice into a casual tone.

"I said...uh...I asked why you didn't take me to the nurse?" I looked at him and realized that I didn't know the answer to that question, either. He blinked, obviously not buying the pathetic lie, but not curious enough to pursue the issue. Or maybe he's letting me slide for now, I thought. That could mean trouble later on. I knew that Seto always followed up on things when you least expected him to, always catching his opponent off guard. Always in control of every situation. "Don't be stupid, mutt. I only came so I could get out of that travesty of a learning facility. At least I can get some work done in here. Aren't you happy? You don't have to learn anything else for the rest of the day. Now leave me the hell alone." Turning back to his work, he began typing once more, and I turned to leave. If that's really what he wanted, I would give it to him. I would do anything at all, just to give him a single moment of happiness. If he would only accept it.

"And clean off your face while you're at it. You look pitiful."

I walked back out, into the hall. Passing a few more rooms, I reached the bathroom, my favorite bathroom. The one that has my favorite stall, where I can sit on the ground comfortably, without being noticed. It was the bathroom that was used the least out of all the others, because of its location. Farthest from the school exit and entrance, upstairs and in the back wing. I had one class that was only a few halls away, the class I was supposed to be in right now. But I'm sure the teacher didn't expect neither Seto nor I back before the end of the class. Judging from the time it had been when I'd left Seto in the room, I still had twenty minutes before the bell rang. Perfect. But first...about this blood. I wet a paper towel and cleaned all the mess from my face. It hadn't been much at all, I just hadn't noticed it, so it had spread across my face slowly. It had all come out of the nostril I had used earlier this morning. I supposed that maybe I should give that one a rest for awhile. I still had one more, anyway. I locked myself in my stall, and pulled out my cigarette box. I couldn't bring everything I used at home, since I was at school, so I used my old school ID card from last year to cut the lines on. Spreading the substance around the card, I watched as the blade slowly ran across the picture of my face, cutting into the plastic deeper with each passing day. My features were barely discernible anymore. Soon, I would be almost unrecognizable. But it was just a silly school picture.

I was ready. But a thought struck me. I didn't have anything to drink. And I couldn't bear the thought of swallowing it down, eating away at my throat and esophagus, making me retch uncontrollably. There was no way. I'd have to get something, but what? There was a soda machine outside the bathroom. I could run out really fast and grab one, and come right back. But what if someone came in and saw? I couldn't very well say, "Hey, don't go in there, that's my stall!", could I? I'd look crazier than I already did. But I'd already got the stuff out of the bag, there was no way I could put it back in without losing some of it. I felt trapped. Just as I as about to make a move, I heard the door to the bathroom open, and someone came inside. "Joey?" I knew that voice. It was Seto! But looking for me? That didn't make any sense. Suddenly, I realized that if he found me, he'd find a lot more than just me in this stall. I pushed any feelings of panic down and kept my cool. I would be silent. He wouldn't come into the stalls, and he'd see that, whoever was in this one wasn't answering to Joey, and he'd leave. I stilled myself completely. "Joey..." he called one last time. I heard the door open once again, and footsteps led outside. As the door shut, I let out the breath I didn't know I had been holding. That was too close. But what did Seto want with me? I shook my head, ridding myself of the thoughts. It didn't matter, I told myself. It wasn't what you wanted. Standing up, I, ever so carefully, lifted up the card that had the lines cut on it, and slid it behind the toilet, in between the base and the wall, just in case. Hastily unlocking the stall, I pulled a dollar out of my pocket and flattened it between my fingers as I walked out of the bathroom. The machine was directly across the hall, not more than five steps away from the bathroom door. I selected the soda I wanted, and it fell from the machine and I grabbed it, dashing back across the hall the way I had come. I hadn't seen a soul since Seto, and it couldn't have been more than six or seven minutes later. I hadn't lost much time. Back in the stall, I listened silently for a moment, just to be sure that no one had come in while I had gone. There were a few moments when my back had been turned, but I hadn't heard a thing. Judging the area safe, I slid the metal lock across the door and went back to work.

Fishing the card from behind the toilet, I was relieved to find it completely undisturbed. The drug, while one of the cheaper versions of it's class, was nonetheless expensive in large quantities, especially for someone so young as I. There was no way I could afford to lose a single line. Wasting no more time, since I wasn't quite sure how much I had left, I brought the straw up to my nose and placed it just inside the nostril that hadn't been dripping blood everywhere earlier, deciding that to be the safer route. If at all there was a safer route to be found in this game. Holding my breath and clamping my other nostril shut, I took up one line.....two....three. Sniffing hard, I tilted my head back and allowed the powder to work it's way into my body. The burning...it was so good...I loved it. "Ah!" I involuntarily let out a soft sob at the feeling, I had been waiting to do this. But, inevitably, after the burn settled, it slowly turned into the dripping. It drips slowly down through my sinuses, gets caught in the back of my throat and makes me dry heave a few times. It's got an awful taste, which varies from ball to ball, but is always unbearable. And it was upon me. "Oh, god..." I whispered, feeling the mucous gather in my brain. I opened the soda and took a quick drink, and began trying to cough it up. God, it was so awful, but I had to try to keep quiet. I could be rather noisy while working the drugs through my body, and I sometimes forgot where I was in the rush of the whole experience. After a few more minutes of torture, the feelings of nausea were replaced, once again, by feelings of excitement and interest. I was determined, I was involved, and I was completely alive! I wanted to experience everything, all at once. I wanted to laugh with my friends, fight with my enemies, be everywhere at all times. And I felt capable. I began to laugh, and it was quiet at first, but it grew slowly into a full, rich cascade of tones, echoing all around the stalls, passing from wall to wall, filling me with my own ecstasy.

I was unstoppable. And then, the bell rang.

As the students filed out of their classrooms, I sat quietly in my stall, safe from all of them. Upon cleaning up after myself, I realized that I had left my backpack in the classroom. I would have to go and get it, and the school day was over, so it would have to be now. I was sure Seto hadn't gone back as well, and was probably riding away from the school as I walked, in some sort of expensive automobile. I reached the room I had left over half an hour earlier and found no one inside. No Seto, but no teacher either. I wasn't going to say a word. We both got what we wanted out of the deal. It was all mutual, and we were even. We would never speak of it again, I was sure. But I was very wrong.

I had my backpack, my soda, and my drugs, and I was off campus. I set off in the direction of my house, feeling very neutral about the fact that I was going there for the next few days. Today had been Friday, there was nowhere for me to go until Monday morning. I had resigned myself to my fate long ago. I had accepted it because there was nothing to fight against. This was my life, and I would live it until the very end, however far away or around the corner my demise actually was. I honestly didn't really care all that much. What did it matter? I had already achieved all that I believed I was able to achieve for myself. In my own opinion, there was really nowhere else to go but downhill. If only I were capable of more. If only I were...good enough...

A car slammed on it's brakes directly behind me, causing me to nearly have a stroke. My heart rate was up quite enough, it didn't need anymore stimulation from an outside source. Clutching my hand to my chest, I turned around to see what had happened. I couldn't believe my eyes.

"Get in the car. Now."

Seto Kaiba stood not more than ten feet away from me, right in front of a very black, very shiny, very expensive looking car. It wasn't a limo, but it wasn't being driven by him, either. He stood directly in front of one of the back doors, holding it open and looking at me expectantly. Wait, he wanted me to get in the car _with_ him? That couldn't be right. "Huh?" I asked, scrunching up my nose in confusion. He put one of his hands on his hip and stood dramatically, gesturing with his other hand towards the inside of the car. "Get in the car, you stupid dog! You don't want me to come get you!" Hearing the fury in his tones, I immediately ran to the car and jumped in, scooting over to the other seat so he could sit, which he did. Shutting the door and locking it, he looked up for a second and said "Drive." in a commanding tone. The car moved into traffic seconds later. I was rather frightened, already having been easily excitable due to the drug, but now all of this? What was going on today? I looked at Seto and found that he was already looking at me...had been for awhile. Under the scrutiny of his eyes, I felt as though he was searching for answers to questions he hadn't bothered to ask me. He always thought he had it all figured out on his own. That's how he always got into trouble. I returned the look he had been giving me, but it didn't faze him at all. He didn't even appear to notice. I began to grow frustrated, and I spoke.

"Hey, what's going on? How come you're taking me to your house? And what are you staring at? I'm really confused..." I didn't know what to say to him. How do you convince someone who doesn't care about what's happening to tell you what's happening? I just looked at him pleadingly, right into his eyes, searching for his answer. Finally, he spoke. "After you left the room, I decided that since I promised the teacher I would take you to the nurse, I had better make sure you got there. It would be just like you to get lost on the way. And, just as I thought, you never made it. You want to tell me what you were doing?" He stared menacingly into my eyes, daring me to lie to his face. I had no other choice. I had to lie. "I had to go to the bathroom first, Kaiba. I went to the nurse right afterwards. See, no more blood." I turned my head this way and that, showing him the blood was truly gone. "Oh, really?" he asked, a small grin playing his lips. "Then what's this...?" He reached a hand out and touched my face, lightly dragging a finger across my top lip. I paled immediately, and then, seconds later, blushed madly. What the hell was he up to? He brought his finger up to my face and held it momentarily in my line of vision. I focused on his hand and gasped, clutching my face. Immediately I felt wetness stick to my hand. There was more blood. This time from the other nostril, I knew it. He watched me intently to see my reaction. I was scared, but I still wanted to know what he was up to. I wiped my wrist across my face, hoping to drag off most of the blood before it dried, I already knew how fresh it was.

"So what? My nose bleeds. Big deal, Kaiba. That still doesn't explain why you're trying to kidnap me! Tell me what's going on?"

He was silent for a few moments, evidently thinking out his approach. It seemed as though he really did have something to say to me. I grew anxious, completely at a loss over what it was that he could possibly have to speak to me about. He looked out the window, away from my face, as he spoke. "I shouldn't have to tell you what's going on. I think you know exactly what I mean."

The silence in the car was terribly empty. I was shocked into complete submission. He couldn't mean...no. There was no way he could know. He meant something else, I was sure of it. "No, I ... really don't know, Kaiba. Just tell me what you mean. I'm sure we can talk about it, whatever it is..."

He looked back into my face, slightly amused. Apparently I had said something funny, although I had no clue what it was. "Oh, there isn't anything we need to discuss. It's you who needs to do the talking here. Tell me,Wheeler, how long have you been snorting crank?"

AN: Well, would you look at that? Our little Seto is all grown up and identifying his drugs. He sounds really bent out of shape about the whole thing. I know he always sounds bent out of shape about everything, ever, but why is he bent out of shape about Joey and his uh, bad habits? What does Seto care? Or does he....? Dun,dun,dun! Yeah, ok, but I don't actually know the answer to that question, so please don't really ask. All will be revealed when the time is ripe. And, uh, don't really do drugs, or something. Till next time...


	3. falling 30

The Urgency of Life 

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

Hmm. It just doesn't feel sad enough. What do you think? Well, it will progress. This whole story is coming out really quickly. Clear Vision takes forever, because it's written differently. It's a lot harder to write because it's a very delicate storyline, and everything needs to be stressed just right, especially the direct interaction between Joey and Seto. This story is just sad. Or it will be, I swear! (Am I obsessing?) Anyway, I hope everyone's having fun watching these two suffer. I am! It's just so _romantic_, to watch them desperately cling to each other...But poor Joey, I mean, really! In my first fic, he's tortured every night with nightmares about being burned alive with Seto, and in between chapters I have him moonlighting with a terrible physical/emotional addiction. I really do love Joey. You may not see it, but this is how I show love. Pray to whatever god you think will listen that I NEVER fall in love with you!

falling........ . . . . . . . . .

I choked on his words. They couldn't possibly be what I had just heard. How could he have known? There wasn't anything I did or said that would have given it away that obviously, to the point that he could identify my precise drug of choice. I must have had the most ridiculous look on my face, but still, he didn't laugh at me, although I was still waiting for him to. In just a moment he would tell me all about how stupid I was and how I deserved everything that happened to me. How he hated me and would never care about me, for even a moment. How he wished I was dead. Or worse, how he didn't care if I was or not. Every possibility rang in my ears, each one louder than the last, until they drowned out all hope and reason. "How ...long....?" I averted my eyes as far from him as I possibly could. I had to get out of here. I was in serious trouble. If he knew, the others must know as well. What had I done to give it away? Surely not every kid with a nosebleed was immediately labeled as a tweaker, so it had to be something else. I couldn't keep myself under control. I was already extremely strung out as it was, and now Seto wanted to have a heart to heart? With me? He knew that I was Joey Wheeler, right? I refused to believe that this was happening. "Please...let me go..." I whispered quietly, hoping that if he truly was concerned he would see the stress he was placing on me. No such luck.

He had been watching me this entire time, waiting for my reaction. Why was this so interesting to him? Did he think I was just stupid? Was he going to tease me about it in front of everyone? Or was there some ulterior motive behind his actions? There was no way to tell with Seto, if anyone could mask their true intentions, it was him. Still watching me with that empty, expectant gaze, he leaned in towards me slowly, noticing that I would probably run from the moving vehicle if I wasn't calmed soon. He reached out to my face once again, only this time he wasn't trying to prove anything to me. He wiped my upper lip with his finger, finishing the job I had hastily tried to do minutes earlier. When he was done, he sat back again and calmly watched the outside world as it sped by his window. "How long?" he asked again, only this time, it was a completely different question. The first time he had asked, it had seemed like more of a threat or a taunt than a question. This was a softer version, which had all the impressions of a worried inquiry. He seemed to understand that I had felt under pressure when he tried to interrogate the answers out of me, because his gaze was still directed out the window.

I wondered briefly why he needed to know so badly, he was willing to play these human, emotional games to get what he was after. I decided that it couldn't hurt to tell him, he already knew the worst part.

"Almost a year..." His eyes seemed to respond to my answer, they widened ever so slightly, but other than that there was no other proof that he had even heard me. I leaned back into the seat next to him, and I realized that this was the closest I had ever been to him, physically. We were well within a foot of each other, and I burned the moment into my memory permanently, thinking this would be the first and last time. It was enough for me. It was certainly more than I had ever dared to hope. In fact, that pretty much described most of the things that had happened today. I looked back at Seto, who was again studying me, although when my eyes met his, his intensity softened a bit. He must have thought I was still terrified of him. In a way, he was right. What ever could he be after? What could I possibly have that he would act this nicely towards me to acquire? That prospect would terrify anyone, I imagined.

The car rolled to a halt and I realized we were parked on a huge driveway. "We're home. Grab your stuff, mutt", he muttered as he opened the door on his side. I opened my own door and slung my backpack over my shoulder, stepping out of the car. The driver left to park in the actual garage, which left Seto and I standing alone. In front of the biggest house I had ever seen. I couldn't believe it. I had seen it before, of course, but the view from the street, about a quarter of a mile away, and the view from the actual doorstep, made all the difference in the world. My jaw must have been hanging open for more than a moment, because Seto laughed quietly next to me. "I take it you like it, then? Well, that's good, because this is where you stay from now on. So close your mouth." He spoke with his usual rude and commanding tone, but underneath it there was a hint of something that told me he wore a smile. I couldn't see his face, he had already stalked away, but I knew. I didn't need to see it for myself. I followed him as he opened the front door and walked inside, right behind him. I was still a little shy, I had never been here before, but it was so gorgeous! It wasn't overdone, something I had originally thought to be true about his house and what it must look like when I tried to picture it. I had thought it would have been full of thousands of little things that were both extremely priceless and extremely breakable, but looking closely, I saw nothing like that. He had everything that you would need if you lived in a house. Practical things, like furniture, or appliances. Of course, everything was top of the line, and in perfect condition, but I realized that I had severely misjudged quite a few things about his personal life already. And where were all the maids and servants I had endlessly teased him about? Don't tell me they never existed... He kept walking, even though I had paused moments ago to take in the view. When he reached the foot of the staircase, he turned to see where I was. Realizing that I wasn't coming, he shifted his weight to one foot and took on an impatient stance. "Here, mutt. Heel." He snapped his fingers and called across the room, grinning smugly. I couldn't believe this guy. I had serious difficulty believing that this was the same person I saw at school every day. The person that I believed would never be capable of doing, well, what he was doing right now. He was being nice to me, in his own way, which was tremendously out of the ordinary. I reverted back to worrying about what he was truly up to.

Paying no mind to the way he had called to me, I followed him up the staircase and inside the room he led me to. "You'll stay here. This room is adjacent to mine, the bathroom is where they connect. This way, I can keep an eye on you. You can settle in later, now we talk." I didn't bother trying to say anything in response to that. This was his house, so I would be respectful and play by his rules. I was just in a state of pure shock, all out of happiness, of course. When I woke up this morning, I had been content to get excited because Seto may or may not find the time to insult me today. Now I was sharing a bathroom with the guy. And it had been his idea! I thought about how he had known so much about me and my habits. How had he found out? Did he know other things about me as well? Did he know my other secret...? I hoped not. That would make it a lot more difficult to live in the next room over from him, for both he and I. Fortunately, before my mind could formulate any more hypothetical scenarios for me to stress about, he began to speak. "Sit." He said. He sat down on the bed, and waited for me to take my place next to him. I looked at him for a moment, taking in the situation, then I nodded to him and sat down. Not incredibly close, like before, but close enough. I spoke first, before I even knew what I wanted to say. It just came out. "How did you know? Did I do something? Did someone tell you? You have to tell me, do my friends know? D-"Before I could fling another random question through the air he clamped his hand over my mouth. "Shut up. I won't talk to you if you're just going to act ridiculous. Ask one question at a time." I nodded apologetically, I had been too frantic. He released me and continued. "Well, you don't need to worry about anyone else. I'm sure your little friendship club members are far too simple to see when their friends are in real trouble. However, I can't say that I noticed anything unusual about your appearance until today. But I know what I'm looking for at this point. No, you're not glaringly obvious, but there are signs. But signs are meaningless if no one is looking for them." I said nothing, but listened to every word. Just that morning I had been looking in the mirror, noticing the small but telltale signs he spoke of. "Then...how?" I asked him. He looked at me for a moment and then looked over, pensive, as if what he was about to say would make me angry. "I just knew you wouldn't go to the nurse. I went to see what it was that you went to do instead. You were my responsibility until the end of the period. I followed you to a hallway, but then I lost you. I finally caught up with you as you ducked inside that deserted bathroom, but when I called your name, you didn't even answer me. I knew you were in that bathroom, so I was curious as to why you didn't want me to know you were in there. So...I pretended to walk out. But I didn't. I snuck into the stall next to you after you ran outside. When you came back in, I was already in the stall. I stood on the toilet seat and watched you do everything...." He trailed off. I was upset. Not very, but he had no right to watch me do something like that. It was almost like he had actually watched me go to the bathroom, or take a shower. It was extremely personal, what I had done, what he had seen me do. Still, I said nothing. He knew that I was upset, and he understood that I had a right to be. That was enough for me.

"So then what? So you saw everything? What are you trying to say?" I needed to get to the bottom of this. There was a reason why he was saying all of this, and he wasn't telling me what it was. I wasn't mad, but with each passing second I grew more nervous at the unknown prospect and what it could be. "Are you angry with me?" He looked at me with wide eyes and shook his head slowly, back and forth. "No, of course not," he stated simply. "Then what is it? What does my personal life have to do with you? Since when do you care about the decisions I make? Last time I checked, you hated me more than anything else in the world. What's changed?" I was so confused at this point. He stared at the bed, or rather through the bed, his eyes unfocused. "I don't know if...anything's changed. I don't really know why but....I don't really think I ever hated you. You just seemed to want me to...hate you. You really acted like you needed me to...." 'He's right', I thought to myself. I did always try to make him hate me. I thought it was the second best thing to making him love me. At least I always made him feel passionately about me. I wondered if I had screwed this whole thing up from the very beginning. Still, I couldn't go back now. "Well...maybe I did act that way. But...I won't anymore. I don't want things to be that way ever again." I thought about what I could say next that wouldn't push this whole conversation over the edge. "I'm a lot different now, from when we first met. I think you are, too." I left it at that. No need to get heavy so early on in the game. I didn't feel all that well. I needed another line or two, it seemed as though it had been forever since those last three lines. And I was getting tired, not to mention irritable. When it begins to leave my system, the withdrawals kick in, and I am never a pleasant person. I thought about Seto and how he would feel if I did the drugs in his house. I was sure the thought had crossed his mind when he decided to take me to his house against my will. I wondered if I should even bring it up. Deciding it would be a bad idea, I decided to wait until he was done talking to me. "So, then," I began, "what do you feel about it?" He hadn't looked at me in the eyes in quite awhile, and when I asked him that, he looked ever farther away, if such a thing were possible.

"I feel...." He stopped speaking for a good minute, lost in thought. "I feel that you are needlessly making yourself more miserable than you already are." He sat up, finally able to act like himself once again. "I don't really know why you've been doing them. And I can't fully explain why I need you to stop. But...I don't want you to die. And you are dying. Very slowly, yes, but killing yourself slowly is a very selfish thing to do. I can see you dying, right here. Every time you use, you die a little bit more. Watching you today made me realize that" He began to act upset, not with anger, but with helplessness, a concept he did not fully understand. This was a situation he had no control over, and he did not know how he could seize that control. Drawing himself up to his full height, he looked around the room with empty eyes, as if searching for something else to take control of in place of me. But he knew as much as I knew that he would never be able to tell me what to do, no matter where I lived, or who I lived with. And it bothered him. Not because he wanted control over me, but because he realized that he couldn't save me from myself. I would have to do that. And I wasn't sure that I really would. Still, I got the feeling that he would try anyway. I've never known Seto Kaiba to not do something that he wanted to do, just because someone told him he couldn't do it.

"Well, you're here now, and you're not leaving, not until you die. Whether you die in sixty years or sixty days really isn't any of my concern. Kill yourself on you own time. I suppose it will all depend on how badly you want to leave this place." With that, he stood off of the bed and turned to face the door, looking at me from the corner of his eye, the way he always used to when he wanted to show me that I wasn't important enough for him to fully face me in a conversation. "I trust you'll be all right on your own for a few minutes? I'm going to the kitchen. I'll be back after I decide what you'll eat for dinner." Without waiting for an answer, he walked out the door, very importantly. For some reason, I felt a lot better after that. He had put on his old "Kaiba" act to make me feel more comfortable, which was probably the sweetest thing anyone had ever done for me. I knew the redness was spreading across my cheeks, but I didn't care. I wanted to cry. I wanted to laugh. I wanted to scream. Something, anything to express this feeling I had. A feeling that I had given up on, long ago. The feeling of what it would be like if Seto loved me in return.

I thought that now was as good of a chance as any. I stood up off that bed and went into the bathroom. Which was huge, which I don't need to tell you about. I had just wanted to see what it looked like. I wasn't going to check out Seto's room until he showed it to me. I knew that few people, if anyone at all, had ever seen it. If he chose to show me, I'd understand how much it was truly worth, and I couldn't ruin that for either one of us. Walking back into my room (my room still sounded very strange to me), I noticed an actual table and chair set. I went and sat in the chair, pulling my box out from my pocket. I slid the plastic card out from inside the box and set it in front of me. Pulling out the necessary tools, I opened the bag and scraped out some more with the blade. I had only cut it about halfway when the door to my room swung open and Seto walked in. Not seeing me on the bed, he surveyed the room for a moment before spotting me finally, hunched over in a chair, mid-tap. I stared at his face, waiting for his reaction. I hoped fiercely that he wouldn't be upset or hurt. I knew how he felt about it. I just couldn't help myself, and I think he knew that, as well, because after a moment of awkward silence, he blinked and continued saying what he had planned to say before he saw what I was up to. "So, I was thinking that, since I have no idea what you like to eat, maybe you can make your own decisions for awhile. At least until I learn what your favorites are." I felt really awful about it after that. He was awfully accommodating. I hadn't lived in his house for more than half an hour before I started using his property to support illegal activity. And he hadn't even left the room for more than five minutes. He had said what he came to say and was now standing by the door, looking at it with his side to my face. He most likely felt as though he were in the way. I couldn't watch him feel that way. "Seto...don't leave. I...I won't do it right now. OK?" I hoped it would make a difference, to show him that I would put his feelings about my addiction before my own. I didn't want him to think that I didn't see how much it affected him. He made a face, almost like a cringe, but more of a determination to get something over and done with. "No...go ahead. I'd rather you do it with someone watching over you...just in case. I know that particular drug can give you a stroke, if you do too much at once. I'm just going to go back to the bed and sit down. You tell me when you're finished."

Never in my life had I ever felt like such a terrible person. This was the person I had forced into being my enemy unwillingly? It was a good thing I was killing myself, I didn't know how much longer I wanted to stay alive and taint the earth with my infectious existence. Since he seemed to understand that I really needed to get some of the substance in my system, he patiently but quietly waited at the edge of the bed. I didn't want to tell him that it wasn't ready yet, but I also didn't want to make him do more than he had to for me. "Hey, Seto?"

"Yeah"

"Uh, it's not quite done yet." I didn't know just how much he knew about it. Maybe he'd know what that meant.

"What do you mean?" Maybe not.

"Well, I'm gonna have to explain this stuff to you. Promise you won't be upset?" I wanted to make this as easy for him as I possibly could. He turned to me and spoke, "I won't be upset with you. Can I come over to where you are?"

"Yeah." I pushed the chair facing mine away from the table with my leg, gesturing for him to sit there. I would have to teach him the basics. What if I really did need his help one of these times? Suddenly his idea of sticking around began to appeal to me a lot more. I'd never really thought about the dangerous aspects of drug abuse too much, I had always considered it to be dwelling on the obvious. What else were drugs besides dangerous? Still, the more Seto knew, the more I'm sure he would feel as though he had taken some sort of control over an aspect of our situation. Which was exactly the kind of thing that would help him feel better about it. If I had any sort of control at all, I needed to give that up to Seto, it was the least I could do for him. Besides, he was much better with that sort of thing anyway. Almost in a strange way, everything I was lacking in, he excelled at, and the same was true for him with me. I knew his faults, he couldn't ever just let go of a situation, even when to hang on to something would only cause him harm. He retained ownership of the things that were his, and even in death his grip would not loosen, I thought amusedly. I wondered if that was exactly the situation he had created for he and I. I thought back to what he had told me earlier, about how the only way out of his mansion was death. Whatever happened between us from here on out, it was likely to be a long and fruitless road. The paths I followed tended to be so. But if he chose to strap himself to me in the way he was proposing... I wanted nothing more than to make his life easier for him, but he was forcing me into a position where I would end up causing him nothing but grief. I wouldn't ever get off those drugs. That's just what I had come to accept. I never said never, but still, that was a challenge that in no way was I a complete enough person to take on. I was still so hollow in places, and until those places were filled, I would have to keep filling them myself, the way I had been.

He looked at me nervously, and I immediately knew from the look he had given that he had never seen a drug up close before. I guess the rich weren't as privileged as I had assumed. "You've never done any drugs before, have you?" I asked incredulously. He frowned and shook his head. "I think that the social class difference between us is so great, we might as well be from different countries," Seto commented on my remark. "In my neighborhood, when I was growing up, there really weren't any drugs to be had. I mean, I'm sure anyone could get them if they wanted to. Rich people like to get drunk more, though. Oh, and they'll get hooked on prescriptions sometimes, too." I was surprised at this new wealth of knowledge. And here I had always thought that rich people had to be on the real, hard-core drugs. They were the only people who could feasibly afford to be on the drugs...and they never were. Ridiculous.

"So, you don't know anybody who does any illegal drugs? Like, real drugs? Morphine pills don't count..." I grinned at him. This didn't have to be so bad.

"Never. Do you know anybody...else...besides you, who does them?" My eyes grew huge as I looked at him, he was so out of place sitting here beside me. It made him all the more interesting. "Seto, maybe you should instead ask me if I know someone who _hasn't _done any. It feels strange to say this out loud though. We never go around talking out loud about it. It's just understood." It seemed almost silly when I tried to explain it to someone who grew up in a place where my unspoken universal laws were no longer in effect. I'd never questioned any of it, it all just seemed like good common sense. "I guess that sounds strange you, right?"

Seto laughed. "It is a little strange. But overall I think that yours make a lot more sense than mine. All we really do with drugs is try to impress other rich people with the most expensive or exotic things we can find. At least yours brings all the people closer together. In a weird way....What are you doing with that?"

I had picked up the blade, hoping that Seto was comfortable enough now that I could continue with what I had been doing in the first place. We were having a lot of fun, but it could be even more fun if I could just finish this....

"You want me to explain it to you?" I asked cheerfully. Maybe if I kept a sunny disposition, the mood wouldn't become quite so heavy again. "Yeah, just tell me everything as you're doing it." He was a quick study. I wasn't afraid that he would be tempted to join me, but he did come to know everything he'd need to if he ever decided he'd like to become a huge drug addict. "OK, so when you buy this stuff, you're looking at the color, the smell, and the consistency. You don't get anything that's remotely orange in color, it'll rot your brain right out of your head." Seto looked amused. "Hey, it's not funny. Seriously, one time I had nothing, absolutely nothing, and I was waiting on someone for three days. A friend of mine offered to share for awhile, and I took her up on it. I found out why later. The stuff was seriously _orange! And_ it smelled like old women's perfume.." At this, Seto began to laugh out loud, as I described to him the faces I had to make in order to choke that stuff down. "And seriously, I sneezed out pieces of my sinuses for weeks. Never again, man, I'm telling you." Seto continued to watch as I finished up the cut job, which was perfect since I'd been able to talk to him while I cut, making the time fly by. "Why do you have to do that for so long?" he asked. I glanced up at him apologetically. "I'm about done, Seto. I'm sorry it takes so long. But honestly, the longer you do it, the easier it is for the person to take. Generally, when you buy it, you want to get it in rocks, you don't want the loose powder. But that means you have to take the time to refine it for your body. If I did a line that was cut badly, it wouldn't dissolve right, and most of it would sit in my head, and that can lead to some problems. It's so much easier for me this way," I tried to explain it to him so he would understand. It seemed that he did, and I began to separate some of it into lines. He watched me carefully, studying everything I did.

"How do you know if you're doing too much?"

That had been a question I was hoping to avoid. I didn't want to answer him truthfully, but if he wanted to know, then I would tell him. "Well, there's no sure way to tell." His eyes widened, so I tried to detail my explanation. "When you first start out, whatever you do is enough to keep you going. After awhile you become familiar with visually gauging about how much you'll need, but it constantly changes, because every time you habitually use, your tolerance goes up a little bit. I take about 12-15 lines a day, if I'm not out to have fun. A normal school day." He watched my hands, but nodded in response to my answer. "So, if you guess too much, you could die?"

"....well, I suppose technically, yes. But you'd have to be really unaware of your own limits in order to do that. I know mine very well, Seto. You don't need to worry." I smiled at him. He gazed at my smile, but didn't return it. He was lost in thought.

"And yet," he mumbled, "I worry so much, it makes me sick."

I didn't know how to respond to that. It's not like he really wanted me to just quit, right? Deciding to remain silent, I finished preparing the lines and took up my straw. "Well", I said to him as he sat back, and looked at me questioningly, "I'm all ready here. Do you still want to be this close while I..."

"Yes." The reply was firm but not dictating. He would stay with me. I rather liked this arrangement. It made me feel as though...someone had finally stood up and taken notice of what I was doing to myself. I knew it, the people around me knew it, but, while they all knew, they chose to see past it. As if it wasn't there. As if my body wasn't being slowly put to death. But Seto, he saw it and he did not see past it. He stared at it and watched it engulf my entire being. And he could not do anything to stop it. But still, he kept his watchful eyes upon it, waiting patiently, for it to slip up, make a mistake, or reveal a flaw. I'm sure that that's what he was waiting for. Why else would he spend all that time learning everything he could. I could tell he was formulating some sort of plan to 'rescue me' or however he saw it. I didn't care either way. What mattered most to me was that he accepted me with my flaw. He looked at my addiction as often and as interested as he seemed to be when he looked at me. He took it gratefully, as a part of me that he would have to live with, work with, try to heal, however he saw it. But he saw it. That's what I was happiest about.

He turned his head away, giving me privacy. Before I began, however, I felt a light pressure on my shoulder. I turned to see what it was, and I found Seto's hand on my shoulder. Giving me support, even if I needed privacy, or didn't want or need him there. He was there anyway. The happiness I felt at seeing him like that was almost enough to keep me alive without the drugs. But almost doesn't help me, no matter how happy or satisfied I may feel at one point. Sooner or later, it came for me. That was just the way it was. I had let my soul become at ease with this fate. Only through time would I be able to show that to Seto. I only wished that he could see all the vain futility in it that I saw. Maybe then he would understand how this was meant to be. I was meant to be this way. There wasn't any other way out.

falling.... . . . ............... .

AN: Oh god. A long very chapter, my friends. It took me forever to write this thing. I really, really like it, though. I kept saying to the boys, Seto and Joey, I was like, 'hey' and they were like 'yo' and I was like 'ok, this is the end of the chapter now', and they'd be like, 'nope' and then I'd be like, 'hey, guys, seriously, stop the chapter, this is over', and they'd be like 'no way jose' and then I'd be like 'GUYS! Will you stop doing stuff? If you keep doing all this crap, I can't stop typing it. STOP DOING STUFF!' and so I just drugged Joey, that seemed to work. Good-bye, my friends!


	4. falling 40

The Urgency of Life 

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

Yeah...this is finally beginning to approach getting ready to become close to the level of sadness I want to achieve. Not quite there yet. But still, onward we march, towards the goal of the ultimate Sad Ness! Please, everyone, if you're still clinging to the happy-ending theory, please release now! There is a 99.9999998 percent chance of character-death, although I'm still not sure who. Just call me Mr. Vague, indeed. Ahem. Joey. We think you may have a problem. This is called an intervention... (AN: there will be no intervention for poor Joey. Rest assured we won't interfere. We love to watch him destroy himself slowly, we thinks this is romantical.......)

falling. . . . .......................... . .

Every day following that one before, the one I described, the day that went on forever, and each one after it was nearly the same. I was falling victim to dependency still, only I wasn't alone anymore. And still I fell. I wanted it, needed it, I loved it! It was worth all the trouble it caused me. And nothing within me changed, for nearly an entire month. This addiction I housed became larger, not noticeably at first, but before long I realized that what I had bought to last me for the whole month was nearly spent in it's entirety. A whole week early. I hadn't noticed it at all, but there was no other explanation. I had done them all myself. My lines were getting longer, a bit thicker, but the after effects of these seemingly tiny changes manifested themselves with a vengeance. I had no cash, no way of getting any on such short notice. And enough to get me through three more days, if used sparingly. I had no idea what to do. Usually I'd get the money through my father, stealing a bit here and there throughout the weeks, asking for a bit here and there, until finally I'd produce the amount I needed. One hundred and fifty dollars. For a seventeen-year-old boy such as myself, this was in no way considered pocket change. Frankly, I was extremely proud that I had been able to keep that up. But I lived with Seto now. And while I was happier than I had ever been by far, the old ways of acquiring cash no longer applied. Three days. I felt the weight of everything that threatened to fall from underneath me, all of it on my shoulders. Mentally, I was running, tearing through the pathways of my mind, desperate to escape what I knew I'd have to turn around and face, alone. Soon.

I would have to ask Seto for help.

Everything I did around him recently made me feel like the most insensitive person alive. I tried so hard to spend every spare moment I could with him, and we did do most everything together, but he, while having nothing but the best intentions, spent most of our time together playing 'take care of Joey'. Which, as it happens, I really needed. I had been severely careless with my health and well being before he took me in. He realized within a few hours of my having moved it, that I ate three, perhaps four times a week My only other source of intake was inhuman amounts of soda, and full package of antacid pills per week. Before long, he had me eating once, sometimes twice in a day. The drug killed my appetite as always, but I began to train my body to feel hunger regardless of what I was on. Not to say that he treated me like a child, nor did I see him as any sort of caretaker. It was just that he noticed things about me that others always seemed to miss. Always missed, perhaps, because they weren't in fact looking for anything at all. I did my best to return all these favors to him, and he saw my efforts, but this...relationship, you might call it, that we were in, called for very specific players to play very specific roles within it's structure. Roles both he and I fit into quite well. We were exceptionally compatible with each other, especially when it came to playing house, which amazes me to this day why we didn't see it sooner. Our life in his house was happy. Happy may not seem like a very expressive word to describe the rightness I felt being next to him at all times, but it was a feeling I had been searching for. And this was the only place I was ever able to find it, so I give it the proper credit it deserves. He and I were happy. We never discussed what may or may not be happening between us, why should we? Why dissect something to give it a name and a purpose when everything already fit so well together? We both felt that the other was on the same wavelength at all times, ever and always connected by our simple closeness. The idea of 'my room' had been abandoned long ago, he and I shared the same room. There was no reason why we should remain separate whilst sleeping, when it was obvious that we spent every waking moment together, or in the pursuit of being together. It was a happy feeling that we shared, that we refused to give a name, lest we tarnish it with human contact and, inevitably, human error.

As our lives slowly, but still rather quickly, became closer to resembling one solid, whole life, the time approached me alone. The hour when I needed to buy more. It was a simple task, easy enough to accomplish, but it represented much more than it actually was. It was a sale, that was all. But it was also a contract. An emotionally and physically binding contract that demanded of the user a chunk of their unused life, in exchange for the contents of the bag, which they could use to fill in the empty holes left after the damage had been calculated, and subtracted from their lifepoints. However long it took to finish off the bag, those moments were immediately confiscated, never to be felt or had, seen nor experienced. And I still continued. But I had reached the last day of my previous agreement, and needed to strike up another deal soon. Since my tolerance was still slowly building, there was no doubt that the next one would go even quicker than the one preceding. I was fresh out of ideas. My only monetary resource was gone, I had left it behind. I never wanted for a single thing now that Seto was around, he made absolutely sure of that, but I desperately did not want to ask him to contribute to this. I had so far been able to keep his hands completely clean, and I was determined that he stay that way. This was a part of my life that I could never share with him. All he could do was try to pick up the pieces of myself that I so casually tossed around and shattered, as though they were nothing to me. It was all he could do. I knew that it drove him mad with worry. I saw what it did to him inside. I wondered why I didn't stop, if only for his sake. I knew how deeply I cared for him, but why was I not able to treat him better than this? He deserved so much more, but he saw nothing of it. I was his only concern, his never-ending source of concern and worry. Still, I knew he would do any thing I asked of him, simple or impossible, which is why I made a habit of never asking him for anything. I never wanted him to feel as though his money mattered to me in any conceivable way, so I pretended he didn't have any. Once before, I had asked him for money at school in the cafeteria, because upon arriving I realized I'd brought nothing to eat with me. He handed over more than enough without a second glance, and when I apologized several times, promising to never let it happen again, he just watched me calmly, and, when I had finished, he said that I could forget my lunch every day on purpose if I wanted, and that he never wanted to hear me apologize to him ever again. I really felt bad about that, even to this day.

I decided that I would just ask him already. I would explain myself, and tell him about how I used to get the money, and how I couldn't anymore, because of the move. And I wanted him to know how much better my life was here with him, I would never go back there, not even to ask for money. Which led me to where I came in, full circle. He was at work, right at that moment, but he would be home within the hour. I promised myself that I would talk to him about it tonight, as soon as he got home. Waiting for him, however, proved to be a completely different matter. I had a tendency to think of the worst possible results for all involved scenarios, and play them over and over in my mind, until I was certain that all life was truly in vain. Seto understood this, however, and could instantly recognize when I had spent all day getting myself worked up over nothing. He always found it so amusing that I had spent hours coming up with all kinds of random and unrelated information, and then fused it all together into a nightmare that only I could be terrified of. He especially loved to have me explain to him exactly what it was that had me so completely stricken, and then try and guess at what the original problem may have been. "Humph," I slumped against the couch, making a frustrated noise at the idea of Seto making fun of my wild imagination, once again. I didn't much time to pout.

I heard the front door open, and then close moments later. I stayed where I was, lying back on the couch in the next room over. I was facing the doorway, so I was the first thing he saw when he came through. Finding me awaiting his return, he smiled and sat down next to me, leaning his head back and to the side, against the pillows on the back of the couch. Our faces were looking squarely into each other's, about a foot apart. Neither one of us were anything but completely comfortable with the situation. It was what I had to tell him that scared me so much. "What did you do all day," he asked me? I cringed, not wanting to tell him that I had spent it worrying about this very moment. "Not too much...I had some stuff I had to think about...nothing exciting..." I trailed off, hoping it would sound casual, but somehow knowing it would give me away immediately. Hearing the underlying tones in my voice that only he would be able pick out, he turned his whole frame on the couch until he was sitting cross-legged on one cushion, directly facing me, and my telltale face. It was already red across both cheeks, but I couldn't help but feel embarrassed that I was so easy to read, even if only to him. "Uh-huh..." was all he said to me, as he followed my eyes with his own. Finally I looked at him directly in the face and caved. "OK, fine, I need to talk to you. It's really important, but I don't want you to be mad at me!" Seto, who had been on the verge of laughter, stopped momentarily to look at me, right into my eyes, and he only said one thing.

"There isn't a single thing you could do to possibly make me angry with you. It will never happen. So there aren't any more reasons for you to be afraid of me. All right...?" he trailed off, waiting for my agreement. I nodded wistfully, hoping that he would feel the same after he found out what I had to say. "OK, I'll just...just tell you then...I guess. See, I used to get money from around my house, and my father would give me some, if I asked him at the right times, and I'd do stuff for people around, you know, the apartments. I'd get all kinds of money, all the time. And I can't go back there anymore. Not that I'd ever want to! My life here is so good, I never want to leave! And I never think about how you've got all kinds of money lying around, because I don't need it! Well when I say don't I-"

"Shut up" A hand clasped my jaw shut, I couldn't make another sound, which I'm sure was the point. I nodded slightly in response, hoping that he'd meant it when he said he wasn't going to be mad. "You are rambling incoherently about how you used to acquire 'all kinds of money' and how you do not any longer. I'm assuming that all of this was eventually going to lead to something resembling a solid conversation, however, it won't be necessary. I've been waiting for you to bring this up, but I didn't realize that you would put it off for this long. You really wanted to keep me out of this forever, didn't you?"

I nodded under his hand, which stayed on my mouth, so I couldn't interrupt him, another bad habit of mine. My eyes were fixated on his, and the sadness I felt at having to involve him in yet another burden of my own doing was clearly evident in them. I couldn't hold them back much longer, and eventually one of the tears escaped and trickled down the side of my face, stopped halfway by the hand that covered my mouth. He released my face only just in time for me to fall into his arms, which closed tightly around my slim waist, worn thin from months of habitual drug use. I pressed my face into his collarbone, and hid my arms between my chest and his, curling them up around the outline of his frame. He brought one hand up to brush the hair away from my eyes, and he leaned his face into my ear and finished telling me what he had to say. "I know you have no income, it's a pretty obvious fact. I also know that what you need costs money. Money that you can't get anymore, which is actually my fault, for moving you over here. So I've already made the necessary arrangements. From now on, you'll only have to go through me. Is that all right?"

All the tears I had were for him, and how cruelly I allowed myself to treat him. Why the hell did he keep me around? I was nothing but trouble for him. I couldn't do a thing for anyone but myself, and I wouldn't even do that. I was content to watch myself rot away, and he was the only one who ever made me feel bad for it. I needed him to a frightening extent, but there wasn't a single thing I could do for him in return. No, I even became a burden him as well, draining his life away just as slowly as I drained my own. But even now, he wouldn't be rid of me. He chose me. Over everything that thousands upon millions of 'normal people' could give to him, he chose instead to have me take from him. But however much I despised myself for it, I couldn't tear myself away from him. Lying with my full weight upon him, I cried and cried. There weren't enough tears in the world for the both of us. He knew why I cried, and he didn't like for me to feel sorry for him, but he didn't try to stop me for anything. He let me cry until I had no more tears left, and still he kept me there beside him as I slowly began to breath normally, not disturbing me for a moment. When I regained control of my voice, I turned my face just slightly so that my mouth wasn't pressed directly on his shoulder, and tilting my face upwards, I spoke softly near his ear.

"I cannot leave you. You said yourself that the only way I can leave this place is when Death takes me. You are the lost piece of my life, and there isn't anything left for me out there. I love you more than life itself. But I need to tell you this once, and I'll never say it again. I am very sorry for what I have done to your life. I know that I have nothing to give, and constantly need to take, but I never once felt ashamed or wrong for it until I met you. You are the only person in my life that I feel the need to apologize to, so I'm doing it now. Please, don't ever forget that."

falling... . . . .. i continue . to .. fall . .... .. deeper...

AN: I'm so sad all the time, blah, blah, blah. Ha! I revel in your misery! This is so _romantic_! I can barely stand it! It has recently been brought to my attention that maybe, just maybe, I am the only one here who actually finds this sort of story to be romantic. I confess, I think that Joey being hopelessly addicted to drugs and dying, whilst Seto struggles with the fact that he will be alone forever after Joey kills himself, _so, hopelessly romantic. _Ahhh, I sigh contentedly. And poor Seto, he's desperately living his life day by day, never losing hope that someday, Joey will get better and they'll stay together forever! But that wouldn't be romantic _at all._ This is where I come in. In order to make it more romantic, we'll give Seto even more hope for the future, so his entire spirit is crushed, along with his life and his mind, after I rip Joey away from his mortal coil even earlier than originally planned! It's perfect! This may or may not happen, by the way. It's ultimately up to the boys. Let's see if they're gluttons for punishment.


	5. falling 50

The Urgency of Life 

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

See, now, that last one was pretty sad. That's what I'm shooting for. I guess it can't all be that way. This chapter is going to be kind of scary. Joey's finally going to hit that point of addiction where you body begins to fight back in a last-ditch effort kind of thing. It may be somewhat graphic here. Joey will be both physically and emotionally broken, so he'll say and things you might not like, but bear with him. It's the drugs talkin'!

falling…… . . falling . . . …. faster.

I was sitting at the table, in the room next to Seto's and mine, when it happened. This was the beginning of the final throes of the addiction, physically. Since Seto had been kind enough to actually take on the support of my drug habit, I had been able to get more whenever I needed it, no questions asked. There was no limit to how much I could get. No longer feeling the pressure of 'making it last', I began to experiment, testing my limitations. I wanted to know how much was enough, how much was too much, and how much would never be enough. And my tolerance level built rapidly. Meanwhile, Seto and I continued to grow closer, until we were very nearly inseparable. I truly enjoyed his company, and his mere presence brought me a simple pleasure that I have never been able to describe. It wasn't a passionate feeling at all, especially compared to the way I used to feel about him, before I came to live in his home. It had changed into a strange sensation, not so much a feeling, but more of an ability, a new power. I was able to see more of the way things really were, between Seto and I. I could now see that his soul and mine were more than coincidentally similar. It was like finding a person whose fingerprints were the same as yours. However, the both of us only owned small bits and unfinished pieces of the same whole, which could only be created by a unified effort from the two of us, together. He owned the other piece of me. An impressively large piece that, until recently, I hadn't even realized was missing. And all the while we were together, he was trying to get his foot in the door of this otherworld of mine, the only part of me he didn't know by heart. My addiction was never a topic of discussion between us, due to our varying opinions on the situation. More than ever he was determined, in spite of all odds, to someday help me break free of this inevitable trap I had laid for myself. There was nothing I could say to him to convince him otherwise. His faith in me was unshakable, as solid and permanent as the faith I had in him, although he was a thousand times over more deserving to be the subject of anyone's trust.

At the table, which had become the place in the house where I kept everything necessary to keep my habit going, I had been seated for quite some time. I had begun to feel, in the back of my mind, that the drug was beginning to wear out. This was, by far, the single worst drawback of an almost flawless drug. The feelings of excitement and the endless supply of fun were replaced, slowly and deceptively, with a dark emptiness of the mind. A blank but devastating sense of loss and regret, over absolutely nothing. There wasn't any way to escape it, so I always planned the hour of comedown in advance, so that I would be asleep when it struck. However, for some reason, I hadn't thought of it when I had done those lines a few hours ago. I knew, in the back of my mind, that I did need to come down a long time before my usual bedtime, if only just for a few hours, maybe sleep for awhile. I shouldn't have been experiencing a come down at all, though. I glanced at the clock, across the room. It showed that it had been a little over three hours since I had last used. So why was it wearing off? Hadn't I done enough? Regardless of why, the feelings were coming, they were stronger now, more defined, and threatened to become real. I knew I had to do something. I hadn't dealt with the emotional side effects of a comedown in a long time, having trained my body to sleep through them. What I remembered of them made me shudder, to imagine that it was already upon me. And that had been after doing a small amount, when I was inexperienced. If that had been unbearable… I was going to have to do some right now, before I fell any further. I didn't know if I could handle the emotional onslaught that snuck closer to my mind with every passing second, and since Seto would be home very soon, he would want to stay near me, and I just couldn't do that to him. Knowing the way he was, he'd figure out what was wrong and would stay with me anyway, regardless of how I treated him. I wouldn't risk it. People who need drugs in their system say many things they don't mean, and would never dream of saying otherwise. If I said something that hurt him, I wouldn't be able to forgive myself.

I began to separate the lines from the pile, rushing the job. Thinking about coming down had made me paranoid, and I felt an immense amount of pressure in my mind, begging me to hurry. Still, there was only so much I could rush. If it wasn't well cut, it wouldn't help me at all, so I had to take time out to finish the job. Time that I couldn't afford to spare. I hadn't slept for a long time. I knew that, somehow, two days had ran past me in a rush, but I was still as awake and energetic as ever. Until now. As I quickly but carefully cut the tiny rocks apart, my body saw it's chance and tried to give out completely. My hand gained a thousand pounds in half of a second, and I almost dropped my blade in mid-tap. I stopped cutting immediately. If my body was about to rebel, I didn't want to be holding a razor when it did. But what else could I do? I closed my eyes and mentally claimed control over my muscles, demanding that they obey. Unfortunately, it was Seto who excelled at commanding, not I, and my hands begin to tremble defiantly. It was slight at first, but enough to make my delicate task almost impossible to complete. At that same moment, my vision faded in and out of focus, which scared me a little. Experimentally looking around the room, I found that I could see just fine, but if I tried to focus on a small detail, or read words that were farther away, no matter how hard I concentrated, I couldn't quite do it. I put the blade down for a moment and sat back in the chair. Why couldn't I control myself? What could I do to convince my body to obey me? But I had done this to my body, my mind responded. It was trying to save itself from me. I felt a small wave of sadness as that thought went through my mind. My body, the physical representation of my soul, the only vehicle that could carry me through this world, hated me. It had to take extreme measures against me, to save itself from the poison I forced into it constantly. I supposed that I would hate me as well. But still, I demanded that my body work with me, just this once! Now, when it was important, when there was a decent explanation as to why I was feeding foreign chemicals into it.

I picked up the blade once more. "I will finish this," I told myself, trying to make it real. "I need to do this." I cut a smaller amount than before. Maybe if I cut enough for one line at first, I could do the one and then cut one more, do that, until I had better control over my hands, at least. Then I would cut up the rest, however much I needed at that point. Feeling slightly hopeful that I had a winning strategy, I went at it again, with renewed determination. It worked, for a moment. The blade rapidly moved against the tabletop, and the repeating tapping it made reached my ears, working it's way slowly into my subconscience. What a familiar sound. Taptaptaptaptaptaptaptap…… The sound that followed me wherever I went, echoing in my wake. It was true, I couldn't think of a sound I heard more often, except maybe the sound of Seto's voice. Thinking about him, I realized that I had come a long way since that day, so long ago now. The day he kidnapped me, so to speak. It wasn't that far from the truth. I had just happened to be a willing victim. How many endless days and nights had I spent before that day, doing exactly what I was doing at this very moment, thinking about him, with that persistent tapping the constant background to my every thought? He and I had come so far since that day, it was almost unbelievable. But I, myself, what had changed about me? The moment was almost frozen in time, my hand stopped moving, and the tapping ceased. I gazed at nothing, realization washing over my unstable mind. I was never going to change. This moment I was trapped in was an exact match to the same moment, one year ago. The surroundings and the people were different, but I hadn't moved an inch. I was even hunched over in the same position, using the same straw, and the same CD I had used in days now far gone, when my life was so much worse. Time passed by me almost spitefully, and a few days earlier school had let out for the year. I realized then that I had been stolen away by Seto well over four months ago, and just hadn't seen the time leave us behind. Now I lived in what seemed like a dream, where everything I could conceivably want or need was immediately handed to me, by the only person I had ever truly wanted for my own. It was unreal. And it seemed that I hadn't even noticed it. I wondered if Seto knew how much I loved being alive, because of him. And how much I loved and needed him. I never showed him. I tried, but I had nothing to offer him. He never asked for anything, and why would he? He had never wanted for a thing, why would he be any different just because I was leeching off of him?

I was coming down, but I couldn't see it. The sadness attaches itself to your own feelings, twisting and fraying them until they weren't reasonable or explainable, but just as devastatingly sad. What I was thinking was how I really felt, but only to a certain degree. I couldn't see that, at the time. I couldn't see anything past my unbearable heartache. I felt incredibly dizzy, and my body felt like it weighed more than it was capable of weighing. I should have gone and laid down immediately, but the thought didn't even cross my mind. My thoughts were concentrated solely on Seto.

I must be an incredible burden to his life. I was certainly a huge burden to my own life. Why was I even still alive? When I had first began to do this drug, I had thought it would be great fun, and I also knew that it was a potent enough poison to kill me, slowly of course, but much faster than if I wasn't doing anything at all. At the time, I thought that feeling the way I did for Seto was plenty for me to have accomplished, and since he would never return my feelings, there was really no point in my hanging around, wasting space. He was the only reason I got out of bed, went to school, ate, was functional. Life with him at distance, however fulfilling, was a pointless affair, and only made me feel, more than ever, that I had no business here. I had always been a weak willed person, and it was a waste of time to believe that I had it in me to off myself efficiently. However, it was feasible that I could nurture an addiction, and let it consume me on its own. I could do that. So that had been the plan, and it was flawless in both its execution and its effectiveness. It hadn't taken long at all before my body responded to the chemicals, and called out for more. All the pieces fell into place like clockwork, with no setbacks, and no one to stand in my way. But now that life seemed like no more than a dream, a terrible nightmare that I had woken up from four months ago, only to find that I truly belonged here. It was the most coveted and rare 'happy ending', where all wishes, no matter how impossible, were granted to the fullest. I had everything, because he was all that I ever wanted. So why was I still killing myself? And why hadn't I asked myself this question sooner?

The answer was simple. My life had been reduced to a constantly foggy drug induced stupor. The reason I had started doing the drugs was not the same reason I did them today. But I should stop now. And stop hurting myself, and Seto. With that thought, I stood up triumphantly, truly believing I had solved the problem, and was done with it. But I had forgotten, while I sat in a daze, that my body was not functioning correctly. The drive that had propelled me forward was not enough to help me catch my balance, and I toppled backwards, away from the table, and landed on my back, my face toward the ceiling above.

Without thinking, I burst into tears. I felt so weak. I couldn't even stand up by myself. No wonder Seto felt like he had to do everything for me. He really did. I was pathetic, and I knew it. I wasn't strong enough to stop doing the drug. It was really ironic, when I thought about it objectively. I was doing drugs to kill myself, because I was in love with someone who didn't love me back. But he did now. And why? Because I was doing the drugs. The very thing that was supposed to take him away from me drew him in like a magnet. It was almost ridiculous, the extent of my ill fortune. My tears only came faster the longer I thought about it, and I rolled to my side, shaking uncontrollable with my despair. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I heard a reasonable voice break through momentarily, reminding me that I was coming down, and not to do anything regrettable. It was unfortunate that it took a severe physical withdrawal to see what I had come to realize, because everything I felt in this state was blown out of proportion, and I couldn't see where my own feelings ended and the emotional effects began. It was sheer agony, and it only made me cry harder. Why hadn't I killed myself faster, before all of this happened? Seto, at least, could have been spared the trouble and pain I had caused him. I couldn't understand why he had kept me near him for this long, and so often! He was always around, talking to me, learning things about me, understanding me more every day, until he knew more me than even I cared to know. I shouldn't be here. Perhaps he was like me, just a glutton for punishment. Maybe he felt guilty for the way he had treated me, before he took me to live with him. Oh god! Maybe he felt responsible for my addiction, thinking he had driven me to do them in the first place. It wasn't at all true.

Seto, the real Seto, who at that very moment was preparing to return home from work, felt no such thing, but my mind, nearly broken by days without sleep and a year of physical and mental torture, was very nearly deranged. The drug that I used severely overworked the part of the mind which allows you to be happy. Now it wasn't working at all, having been stimulated artificially for far too long. It needed to heal, as did many other areas of my body. All of the abuse, repeated daily for a long period of time, wore away parts of my body and mind, but I couldn't feel the true extent of the damage until at that moment, when I could no longer hide behind the artificial influence I had grown dependent on. In turn, I would do this to Seto as well. I had to do something, and I had to do it now, while I still felt this way. Although I was not even remotely myself, I knew that in a strange way, I was still drugged, only this time I was under the influence of the _absence_ of any influence at all. And as soon as I woke up the next day, the first thing I would do would be to feed the chemical I craved right back into my system, scattering the remains of any sadness I had to the wind. It was nearly impossible to be sad on that drug. Perhaps that was why I had liked it, still liked it to this day, perhaps even more than ever. And I would do it as soon as possible. I had to act quickly.

Rolling over so I lay on my stomach, I used my arms to push myself off the ground, as far as I could. Getting to my knees and keeping my palms on the ground, I crawled across the floor, stumbling and catching my hands on things clumsily. My body was ready to give up, and I felt intensely faint, but I retained my consciencness through sheer will, for Seto. I would do anything for him. Even if I had to drive him away, I would do just that, if I knew he would be happier. Somehow I found the bathroom, the one that joined this room to ours, and sat up on my knees, fumbling with the handle until the door opened. I fell into the door, tumbling inside. I used a lot of energy I didn't have to get this far, and this time my stomach responded. A wave of nausea descended quickly, and I almost didn't have enough time to push myself over to the toilet. Nearly missing it completely, I draped myself over the seat, my face hanging over the edge. I was relieved that I had been able to get that far in time, but my relief lasted about two seconds before my stomach involuntarily contracted, and I retched into the toilet. I hadn't eaten very well recently, because Seto had been working a lot more, while school was out for the summer. Without him there to make me eat, I didn't eat, and now I wished I had, because throwing up nothing was horribly painful. My stomach forced itself to contract over and over, but there wasn't anything in it to throw up, still it kept on, evidently trying to rid itself of the substance in every way it could. There was so much unused acid in my stomach that it must have been making me sick, and it filled my mouth with a terrible taste. It was like a terrible nightmare, only it was worse than a nightmare, because it wasn't a nightmare at all. It was real, and it was awful. After a few minutes, my stomach slowly understood that the offending chemical was not going to be expelled this way, and the nausea dissipated. Feeling that I was through with the toilet, I pulled the handle, flushing away absolutely nothing. I don't even know why I bothered.

I pulled myself up by grabbing the edge of the bathroom counter, and put the lid over the toilet. Guiding myself with my grip on the counter, I sat on the toilet lid, faced towards the mirror, which was a serious mistake, in my present state of mind. The lack of sleep and overuse I had subjected myself to affected my mind as well as my body. My mind couldn't physically try to eject the intruding substance like my body could, but it lashed out in it's own way, which was far more dangerous than anything my body could do. My weakened emotional state and almost complete loss of physical control drained my sense of reality, leaving me in a kind of distant fog, and my mind didn't know how to respond. My eyes played tricks on me, strained from lack of rest, and completely lost the ability the focus. I stared into the mirror, unable to see what I was looking at very well. Was that me? Surprised, I peered closer, trying to make out the features of the face before me. After several moments, I concluded that it was indeed my own reflection, and I stared at it wistfully. I was pretty sure I looked awful. I must look like this all the time, I thought, appalled at the thought. I looked like a drug addict. I was hideous. No wonder I hadn't been able to catch Seto's eye on my own. I had tried up until now to push the idea to the back of my head, but there wasn't anything to hide behind now. Seto was intense to look at. He certainly wasn't handsome, but he wasn't pretty either. He was lost somewhere between the two, not favoring masculine nor feminine features, instead embodying both. The most attractive features from both sexes were perfectly balanced into a single person, and the end result was breathtaking. And impossible to tear my eyes from. Here, in the bathroom, I couldn't believe that the person I saw before me was the chosen one, the object of Seto's returned affection. It was laughable, really, and I did laugh, right in my own face. I laughed at my reflection, as if it was the one who dared to think that he somehow belonged here with Seto, and not me at all. My laughter grew louder and I closed my eyes, how ridiculous of him to think that Seto would be involved with him. With the presence of my reflection, I was able to see myself as though it were really someone else in the mirror, and my already loosely based grip on reality took the fragmented thoughts and ran with them.

Blinking rapidly at the image, I shook my head, hoping to shake something inside it loose so I could see more clearly. It failed, of course, and I threw both of my fists at the mirror in frustration at my own weakness. As soon as my hands made contact with the mirror, I felt a sharp pain, somewhere in my body, but I couldn't clearly distinguish where the pain originated. I was hopelessly lost within myself. Lowering my hands, I saw a bright color that I hadn't noticed earlier. Bringing my left hand close to my face, I peered at it for a moment while my mind tried to process the information. There was red…it was running down my hand, trickling slowly down my arm. Somewhere in my head, a reflex screamed, signaling that this was something I didn't want to happen. I was bleeding, I realized, and stared at my hand, wondering what had happened. Not having any idea of how to react, I opened my fist, and found the source of the blood. I hadn't ever set the razor blade down, and had carried it around with me through the whole ordeal. When I had balled up my fist and hit the mirror, the force of the impact drove the blade into my palm. Seeing the wound made the connection in my mind, and it began to hurt immediately. Cringing in pain, I took the blade in my other hand. It had a lot of blood on it, and the vision caught my eye, and I gazed at it for a moment. Too bad I couldn't kill myself, I could just end it all now. But I could do something, couldn't I? Perhaps I couldn't kill myself, but maybe I could at least save one of us…. Something had to be wrong with Seto. Surely he saw that he deserved so much better that me, both emotionally and physically. He can't find me in any way visually appealing, especially when seen anywhere near Seto himself. I could see in that mirror right in front of me, and I could see what Joey looked like from here. It just didn't make sense. People who looked like Seto didn't have to settle for anything, so was it possible that he just didn't understand how beautiful he was? He couldn't have a clue, if he was truly able to devote himself to this boy. Well, we could fix that. If I could show Seto how Joey looked on the inside, then maybe he wouldn't want to be with him anymore. Maybe he'd leave Joey, and meet some other boy, another beautiful one, who wasn't addicted to anything, and didn't need to be taken care of. Then, by chasing Seto away, Joey would be the one who was ultimately responsible for Seto's happiness. I smiled drunkenly at Joey, who grinned right back. Our plan would be a success. I would just have to make Joey as ugly on the outside as he was on the inside.

I still had the blade in my good hand, and looking back into the mirror, I lifted it to my face. My hand trembled constantly, and I still couldn't focus on anything, so this was going to be more difficult that I had thought. Well, it wasn't like I needed to see that badly. Feeling my way around, I decided to start small, just to see how much it would hurt. I'd never done anything remotely like this before, but then again, I'd never been this delirious before, either. I wondered briefly if I would remember any of this after I allowed myself to pass out. The edge of the blade finally found my cheek, and I felt a small pressure, accompanied by a sharp sensation, although my awareness of both feelings were severely dulled. I stood there, with the blade tip on my cheek, for a long while, waiting for my hand to move on it's own. It didn't happen, and I realized that I was scared, somewhere inside me. Joey didn't want to go through with it. Maybe he wasn't willing to give Seto to someone else after all. Well, too bad. I spoke directly to the reflection. It was time I took control of myself, even if I had to do it one broken piece at a time.

"You don't get to decide anything, Joey," I mumbled, smiling softly at him. My words were slurred and I stumbled over each one. I'm sure that I was the only one who could understand what I was saying.

"I'm finally going to do something for someone else, and I don't care for anyone but Seto. Not you, not me, no one else matters. So I'm going to set him free. He doesn't deserve to be burdened with your problems. I'm going to save him from you. You, and your miserable existence." I remember being surprised at what I was saying, the part of me that could understand. It was as if I was two people at once, both Joey and the reflection of him, and it was terrifying and thrilling, together in the same moment. Then, I was once again looking at the reflection, and without hesitation, firmly executed the first stroke, fueled by my hatred for the Joey that looked back at me from the glass, pathetically cowering under my glare. That Joey was weak and unhappy, but refused to lift a finger to help himself. That Joey wanted to live his life dependent on Seto, with no qualms about taking another person down along with him, even someone as beautiful and undeserving as Seto himself. That Joey was completely deserving of this, even if there was no ulterior motive. And as I dragged the blade down through his face, that Joey screamed in anguish, and the sound sent waves of pleasure down my spine. I was happy to do this to him, he deserved to suffer for the sake of someone else. I hated him. Looking to see what he would do, he simply stared into my eyes. There was a long, thin gash down the side of his face. The blade was so small and thin, you wouldn't be able to see the cut at all, if it hadn't been bleeding. But it was, it bled a lot, and the blood ran down and dripped off my chin every so often. I couldn't move, frozen where I sat, eyes locked to his face that looked out at me from the glass. My time was up, I realized. My hand lost its strength, and the blade fell from my grasp, making a small clink when it struck the tiled floor. My vision faded, then came back momentarily with full force, lasting only a few seconds. It was enough time to see the extent of the damage I had done to myself. The sight of blood made me panic, and the other Joey was suddenly nowhere to be seen. I was alone, and I realized that I had been the entire time. The other Joey was lost within me, and the injury I had meant to inflict on him was inevitably inflicted on me as well. I would never be free of him. I lost myself in my misery, I had thrown the truth harshly into my own face, and I continued to bleed from Joey's punishment.

I was completely at the mercy of my body, which began to shut down moments later. The tears came finally, I had been waiting for them. I wanted Seto. I needed him. I couldn't leave, I couldn't make him leave, I couldn't do a thing. I didn't understand why he returned my feelings, but I was so very glad for it. I didn't know what was going on. Everything had been getting slowly darker ever since the tears had started, and I gripped the counter next to me for dear life. I cried as hard as I could, trying to force the sadness out, never to return. It was quick to return, as quick as it was to escape through my cries, replenished as though I had accomplished nothing, which was basically the truth. I wanted to run, to turn away from the mirror, I couldn't stand to stare at my weaknesses any longer. I made myself sick.

"Stop it!" I cried, closing my eyes and angrily turning my head away from the mirror. My reflection was beginning to look like it had before, separating itself from me, and I wouldn't fall for it again. "Stop stop it, stop! STOP" I could feel my own eyes on the back of my head, it was unnerving, it was insane, and it wouldn't stop. "Stop, please, stop it, stop, stop!" I screamed and screamed, the words were far from coherent, and in seconds I gave up on words altogether, and was simply screaming, terrified and angry, desperate and empty. My hands were clutching wildly at my face, pulling on my hair, I had to shake the feeling of…I wasn't even sure anymore. I couldn't see anything at all, my eyes were shut tightly, and tears ran from their sides, mixing with the blood on one side of my face, running all the way down the other. And still, I was screaming at the top of my lungs, finding that I couldn't stop. I was lost and alone, I couldn't get away even if I wanted to. Suddenly, a pair of arms came out of darkness, and took hold of my hands, gently pulling them away from my hair. My eyes were still closed, they were swollen and hurt so much that I couldn't reopen them. The sudden contact shocked me and for a few moments I struggled defensively and directed my screams at the intruder. Unfazed by my retaliation, the hands held fast to mine, being as careful as possible, and then released them, only to reach up and place them on my shoulders, pulling me forward, shaking me slightly as though they wanted me to wake up from a deep sleep. The motion shook my grip from the counter, and without the support, I went foreword, not caring whether I fell or not. Before I could hit the ground, my fall was stopped in its tracks, and I felt a swift upward motion immediately following what should have been the impact. My thoughts swam slowly in my head, but I was too exhausted to try to catch them. I didn't care what was happening to my body. Somewhere in my mind, I knew that I wasn't alone anymore, someone had taken me from where I had been found. Then a softness spread itself beneath me, and I was placed on my bed, our bed. Wait…

"Seto!" Please, let it be him. I needed to see him so badly! I was able to lift my eyelids just a bit and I rolled my eyes back and forth rapidly, searching. He was right there, lying alongside me, only he remained somewhat upright, leaning his elbow into the bed to hold himself up. His other arm was still under me, he must have left it from when he carried me in here, not wanting to disturb me more than he had to. When I opened my eyes to find him, he leaned over to me, and said nothing, looking me over fully with wide eyes. Surveying the damage. I self-consciously lifted a hand to cover my face, but it was obviously too late. "I'm sorry", I said, feeling a resurgence of tears. "I don't really know what's happening right now." My words were hard to control, but I forced my lips to work, and I think he understood. Without breaking our gaze, he lifted both of his arms to himself and leaned back into the pillows. One of his hands came up to the one I had on my face, and took the hand away, exposing what I had done. He didn't say a word, instead he pulled my arm over his head, forcing me to follow until I lay completely on top of him, releasing my hand only then. Both of his arms came up around me possessively, and his grip on me was tight, as if someone was threatening to steal me away at that very moment. But we were alone, and now that he was here, some of my sanity had returned. It didn't matter, because the darkness claimed me seconds later, and once again, I was falling… .

AN: Heh. I really liked this chapter. I had the best time writing it. I always enjoy writing about this angsty crap, and oh man this is like, the angstiest angst ever in the angsty history of angst. I think I'll have the next chapter be more of the same, I'm really enjoying this (did I mention that?). This was the part of the story I wanted to get to. (it's super-long). I go back now, they may think I'm not coming back…(in reference to sanity)


	6. falling 60

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

I did not enter into this fic knowing that it would suck my life away….but there we are. I didn't know I was entering a lifelong contract with this crap, I would have gotten some cash out of it, or at least a new special power, all of mine are old news now. Remember when this story came out, when I told you that this story would be so much shorter than my other one? Yeah, wasn't that joke funny? Because I checked my stats, just for kicks, and the word count on this story is DOUBLE the count of the other one, the one that's supposedly "longer". Where did all those words go? I feel like I just got a cell phone bill, and it says I owe serious money, and I've somehow used, like, 10,000,000,000 minutes even though I have no friends and I never call my mother back. So……It's fun to write these guys having such a horrible time. I have been shown the end of the story, and it's awesome. That's all I'm at liberty to say right now. Beware of this and the last few chapters after, until the end of the fic, I issue…

_warning in effect until the end of the story _This fic will now most likely, but not necessarily contain the following: Continuous and explicitly detailed drug abuse and eventual overdose (more of the same, plus added bonus! Same drug, new problems! The advancement of addiction into life threatening stages, and prolonged habitual use side effects, the scary ones that last for the remainder of your life, when applicable) self mutilation, infliction of mutilation upon others, domestic violence, codependency, sexual content involving boy/boy, angst and drama like you wouldn't believe, character death, (at this point, very probable, especially if you have read any of the chapters in this story at all) suicide, murder, which could be fun, and

an overall sadness that took me forever to get just right. So now, smile and be content with life, for you are not in my story, and therefore have nothing to be sad about. Ever. Again.

falling . I .. . know . .. you can't helpme

I was painfully aware of the fact that I was nearly awake, the feel of my body and its physical trappings was already stirring a sickness inside me. I knew that my eyes would open soon, and the darkness that shielded my soul from reality would be penetrated by the harsh light of day. I didn't allow anything in just yet, I needed to drift here for a moment, collecting thoughts and memories from the previous night. I was still for a few minutes, trying to recall every moment, and failing miserably. I remembered….a come down. Yes, my body had rebelled and tried to cleanse itself yesterday, I hadn't quite kept to my schedule. It had been so long since I'd gone long enough without feeding more into my body, I had nearly forgotten the reason I kept that time frame rule in the first place. Well, I was certain that I would never need to know again. I thought carefully, and tried to recall something, anything that had happened the previous evening. Then again, maybe it was best if I let it alone, and be thankful that my mind still cared for me enough to steal my memories, in self-defense. Whatever it was that had happened, it left behind the shadow of a feeling, a mood that I couldn't quite shake. It was a faraway sense of hopelessness, a shadowy sort of emptiness that had somehow buried itself within the realm of my own emotions. An intruder, a virus. It had infected my thoughts last night, I could tell, playing with my misery and forcing up old feelings that I had been crushing down for a reason. And now, I had to remember what I might have had done when faced with those feelings…

I brought my left hand up slowly to my forehead, which pulsated with a strange pressure that was building in my sinuses, centered just above my eyebrows. I had intended to try to massage the muscles just below the surface, but less than a second after my palm reached it's destination it suddenly threw itself away again reflexively. In the next moment, I felt the pain shooting through my hand that my body had sensed, and my eyes were open immediately as the shock of it woke me immediately. I was sitting up before I could even process the information, and I heard a cry mixed with both surprise and pain, which must have been my own. I was hurt, but why didn't I know? Seto, where was Seto, was he in pain as well? Had I done something to him, hurt him in any way? Before the seeds of panic could take root any further in my mind, I caught a flash of something familiar out of the corner of my eye, and was able to catch a glance at the familiar face. I had woken Seto up, who had been asleep directly beneath me, and had felt the full force of my abrupt awakening. Having been woken by my cry of pain, he had responded immediately, instinctively reaching out with both hands and catching me by the shoulders, pulling me back to the bed. In a rush of motion, I suddenly found myself looking at the ceiling, just past Seto's head, which was directly above mine. His eyes were as wide as mine as he found himself on top of me, both of us silently taking in the situation now that it was over. I looked at him with a question in my face, silently asking him to show me that he was all right. I had to know that before anything else could happen. He saw the distinct expression I held and recognized that I was worried about him. He shook his head, negating my suspicions, but he kept his solemn expression, a telltale sign that there was more to the story. I smiled at him anyway, whatever else there was I could deal with.

He did smile back, although behind the expression there was hint of what lay inside him at that moment. It was just a flash, barely there, but it burned so fiercely within him that he couldn't possibly contain it all, and I saw an escaped moment of how he felt inside. Something very bad had happened to me, at least through his eyes, and he was absolutely terrified. Something he had seen or heard the previous night had shaken him so badly, it resonated throughout his soul, echoing into me due to the fact that his soul was just a reflection of my own, and I could feel the aftershocks of the events that he had witnessed. It was awful, the feelings he carried inside of him because of me, and I could not break our gaze, even though I felt he wanted me to. I didn't know what to do next, I felt that I had to do something for him, to make him forget, to keep him from hurting because of me. I refused to become a source of any more suffering for him, and I acted on my determination. He was still looking down on me from above, and I reached up to him and gripped him just below his shoulders with my hands, searching his demeanor for an emotion or reaction to betray itself. Seconds passed, and he revealed nothing of his fear or pain, but the particular way he always looked at me had not changed, even at that uncomfortable moment. Seeing this, I relaxed immediately. I knew that he still fully retained his unwavering feelings for me, he was just scared, worried that I would be taken away from him before he could try anything to stop it. He had always been worried, constantly so, but I had never displayed any actual visible damage, or shown any signs that the drug was taking it's toll on my body. I outwardly seemed to be in complete control of the substance, when deep down he knew that the opposite was the truth. But last night he had most likely seen his deepest and worst fears come to life, unexpected and without any warning at all. I wanted to talk to him about what he saw, maybe it would help me remember more of the evening. My hands, still holding him near his shoulders, loosened their grip and slid over his shoulders and onto his back, and with the leverage I pulled myself up off the pillows and leaned into his chest, silently begging him to hide me from the morning. He immediately responded to my advance, leaning back slightly to accommodate, pulling me closer and holding on with a forceful grip. The embrace itself was in no way painful or threatening to me, but it radiated possession and dominance in waves, as if sending out a warning to anything that would consider the notion of causing me harm. He wanted to regain some sort of control over this situation, and he would find a way to take it, whether it was in my possession or not. He would advance the moment an opportunity arose, as soon as the position showed itself, there wouldn't be anything I could do except play along. I wasn't afraid of him, of course, but he would begin to close in soon, to take what he needed from me, and I would have to let it go, if I wanted to or not. Truthfully, it was never the control I wanted from him, it was his insatiable and nearly violent desire to steal it away from me that I craved, deep down,

in a place that I was barely aware of inside me.

He was silent and motionless, and defiantly unyielding when I tried to slowly back out of the embrace, thinking that perhaps he was finished and was waiting for me to let go. I found myself to be locked in place, guarded from exit by the unstoppable grip he had circled around my slowly deteriorating waistline, an extra point to his already unfair advantage. Grinning at his stubborn attitude, I was secretly glad that he wasn't willing to let me go. Feeling an unquestionable trust in him, I melted myself further into the body beneath my own, completely relaxing every muscle in my body, until I could no longer feel where he ended and I began. I hadn't ever done anything like that before, but with him, it was a moment that I realized I had been searching for, not even fully aware of it.

I was so tired still, and we had been still like that for a good while, neither one of us wanting to break the contact. It seemed as though every moment brought us closer to one another, until we had come as far as this and still we pressed on, needing to know how much farther all of this went, if it even had an end at all. Perhaps it took forever. But I didn't have forever. I didn't know if I had any time left at all. I heard the last of the thoughts as it came, and the weight of the sadness it held bore down on my heart, to think that all we had between us, soon it would be as though it never happened. Would he be sad if I were to die today? Would I be sad? I thought for a long moment about the answer. Yes. I had to tell the truth, if only to myself. I didn't want to die. Whatever had happened last night had broken some shield in my mind that had earlier prevented even the thought from forming. But now it had taken root in my mind and I was torn in two. I was feeling very strange, both physically and emotionally. I wasn't sure what to make out of either one, honestly, both reactions were alien to me. Physically, I felt as though I were drifting in and out of consciousness, even though I had slept for hours and hours, the best sleep I'd had in months. My mind, however, was a mine of unexplored potential that had been discovered on pure chance, and held within it infinite possibilities. Without any drugs in my system, my thinking was more controlled, my feelings were accurate and more easily expressed, and the difference in my attitude and reactions to things was obvious, and would be especially clear to Seto. I doubted that I would have laid there in his arms as long as I had, content to be silent and let his presence surround me, seeking out my own and claiming it wholly. Without the assistance of a chemical to keep my emotions at bay, they seized control and filled me with a new form of energy, one I couldn't identify, but knew was born from my own mind and not from an expensive powder. Instead of a nonsensical and stolen burst of manufactured feeling that left me feeling drained and abused, now I held within me a burning excitement at the raw potential that sparked between us, almost manifesting itself in the air we shared. Still, my body was, while still functioning, worn out in many places and injured, in ways I knew I had yet to discover. But first and foremost, I would learn what I had done that Seto had seen, and what I could do for him to show him I was sorry.

I lifted my head reluctantly and rested my chin on his shoulder, leaning my cheek against his. Inching my mouth forward until it was very nearly touching his ear, I felt an invisible reaction from Seto, a rush of surprise and something I couldn't identify coursed through him in an instant as he felt my lips skim dangerously close to his skin. At the impending physical contact, I felt a sudden and almost identical response within me as well, like an electrical current had surged through me without warning, passed along from his body to mine. "I'm completely sober," I whispered, and smiled into his ear, opting to be amused at the pathetic nature of my life. It was rather amazing, after nearly a solid year of habitually using, I'd spent at least the last half of the total time in a constant affected state. I hadn't felt this close to reality in what seemed like forever, and I certainly couldn't recall the most recent example. I felt good, I felt like myself when I hadn't for so long, but I knew that soon, any moment now, I would find a reason to go back. I would always go back. Each time I came out of the haze, I realized how much I was missing, and how much I wanted to stay. And each time, I always went back. I was too dependent on it, I needed it to function properly. I had spent too much time facing my life from behind the influence of the drug, using it as a shield, and I had so extensively overused it that I was incapable of dealing with the severity of reality on my own any longer. And it never took long for me to remember that…

He was quiet, considering his options before reacting. I didn't want to raise his hopes up only to cast them back down again later on, most likely within the hour, so I spoke again quickly. "I'm not sure how I got this way, but I don't think it will be this pleasant for very long. I…don't want to get up just yet, though. I like this place…being here…." Tripping over what I wanted to say, I somehow managed to get that much out, and quit while I was ahead. I felt somewhat silly, but I forgot it completely in next few moments. He finally loosened his grip on me, and I leaned back slightly, and looked at his face. As his vision fell on me, his previous solemn gaze drained out of his features, and was replaced with a terrible look of regretful remembrance. I followed his wide eyes, which had fixated on my cheek, and I got the distinct feeling that the pictures and images in the back of my mind would come together soon, and I already got a flash of what his gaze was caught on. I remembered now, vaguely, being angry with … myself. And I ….Oh no. I lifted my hand to my face, only to repeat the actions that had me awake in the first place. I yelped out loud, and felt a both a sharp pain and an echoing response, in both my cheek and my hand. Seto stiffened immediately and tried to stop me from getting out of the bed and exploring my injuries, to no avail. I rolled off of our bed and ran right out the door, into the bathroom, and paled at the scene I had left behind the previous night. "Oh, no, ……oh no……no…" I stuttered, not even aware that I spoke. There was blood in various places, not a lot, but there it was, and I knew that it was mine. Walking closer to the dried remains, my reflection on the wall caught my eye and I saw the damage there. A long red line, thin as a blade trailed down my cheek, nearly four or five inches long. I had done it on purpose. Why had I been so angry, angry enough to hurt myself even more that I already did? The only thing I really tried to protect at all costs was Seto….

It began to piece together very slowly, but there wasn't much left to discover. I shuffled unhappily back to the room, and on the way my foot hit something that had been on the floor, sending it sliding across the bathroom tile. I picked it up and brought it back with me, hiding it carefully in my hand. I didn't want him to see what I had used to cause myself harm. I found Seto already out of bed and standing by the bathroom door, patiently waiting to see what I would do now. It was good of him to offer me privacy, but I had come back because I needed him near me. I had hurt myself for being so cruel to Seto. For treating him so badly, while he treated me so well, better than I would ever deserve. I wished that I understood him better, I knew him in a deeper sense than I knew myself, and yet his commitment to me was a complete mystery. I approached him slowly, and stopped within a foot or two of him, eyeing him miserably, almost too afraid to ask. But I had to say something, and I wanted to finish it now, to have it done with and behind us. "Seto…I don't remember a lot of what happened last night, but I remember some things, enough to know that I really hurt you, and myself….Seto, I'm so sorry…." He had averted his eyes when he picked up on the topic I was headed for, and he was still faced away from me after I became silent once more. Maybe he just didn't want to hear it. Maybe he was upset with me, for scaring him, for hurting myself. I would tell him why I had done it, and I'm not sure why I was determined to do this, but something within me knew that he deserved to know why, now that I knew. It was scary, but it was also reassuring, in a way. Perhaps he would see how much I valued his existence over mine, how deeply my dependence on him ran.

Stepping sideways, I intercepted his line of vision and put my empty hand on his chin, turning his face slightly so he could see into my eyes. "Seto. I remember doing this one, somewhat," I took one of his hands and brought it to the injury that I made just for him, pressing his fingers to it and showing him how own it completely. He was confused, my actions were cryptic when left unexplained, I realized, and spoke again, leaning into the feel of his hand on the mark. His touch made it burn, and I felt that perhaps it knew that it belonged to him. "I hadn't planned on letting it leave my system like that, it was an accident. I was so sick with it, I could barely think or move. And I got really sad, when I….thought about you, and how badly I treat you…." He was looking at the exact same spot as earlier, far away from me, but it didn't matter, he was listening. The hand on my face had stiffened at first, not quite knowing what was happening, but now it had softened into me, no longer pressing itself awkwardly into my face. The fingers curved slightly to fit the frame of my cheek, and he held it there lightly, giving me support so I could say the words I meant to say. "I'm not worth the time or the effort you spend trying to save me, Seto. I wish that I could tell you that I wanted you to leave me to die. I wish that it were true. And I wish that….I hadn't had a reason to do this to myself, so I could tell you that it meant nothing. I wish so many things for you, but I can never make them come true." How could I say this without it sounding like he was responsible? I couldn't let him blame himself for this, but I had to say the complete truth. I tried the best that I could, and trusted that he wouldn't judge me for it.

"I've always wanted to have something that you needed, just so I could give it to you, and have made you happy. Just once I'd like to be responsible for something besides your grief and worry. I was upset last night and I had been thinking about trying to do something for you, to show you how much you meant to me. And that I notice just how sad I make you all the time. I am so weak…" I went on a bit, not knowing half of what I said until the words already hung in the air between us, learning some of it for the first time myself. "I can't…give you what you want. What we want. I want to be free of this, Seto, so much…I don't know if you see it, but I'm so sick of being weak. I want to be strong, like I was before. I remember when I could go through an entire day without needing to do this to myself. I could face anything, on my own, it can't have been so long ago. But I can't do that anymore… Without the drug, I have nothing to hide under, and I couldn't possibly survive. I'm broken, in a way. I can't fill in this emptiness inside me with anything else. I'm not sure what was meant to fit there, but it doesn't work like it should anymore. So I'm doing the best I can, for us. For you. I would do anything at all, even if it killed me, in an instant, the moment you asked me to. Do you know? I try so hard to make you see, but what can I give to you when I have nothing at all? And what could you possibly need from someone as sick as I am? I…I…." It was upon me, the truth was here and about to take form, the moment I gave it a name it would be a real entity, and it would be plain for Seto to see as well. Every repressed feeling and every moment of sadness that I possessed inside me came up from the shadows they had been hiding in, adding new weight to my soul that was very nearly beyond capacity. Tears had begun to fall from my eyes and showed to signs of stopping, my voice began to crack under the pressure, but I was so close now. Seto, at hearing my sudden and unexpected confession, had turned back to face me long ago, and was still holding my face, feeling the mark that was his, slowly coming to understand what I was trying to say.

"I wanted you to see what a horrible person I am for letting this happen. For allowing this…feeling I have for you control me. I should have never let you into my life, but I did, because you were all that I had ever wanted. And you still are…but just because I want something doesn't mean I should get it. Especially me, of all people. Seto, I have nothing to offer you but a promise that I will be gone, very soon. So you can finally be free of me. My constant desire for this drug has already killed much of me, the rest will follow shortly. But I knew it would make you so sad, and I can't let you be sad because of me. And last night, I was so messed up, I couldn't think straight, but somehow I managed to come up with an idea to chase you away, before I died, so that when I did die it wouldn't touch you. It was a stupid idea, and I'm sorry for it because it hurt you, but I was….going to make myself into someone you wouldn't like. I was, at the time, hoping to make you hate me. And also, to make you see me for what I really am. I did this," I pressed my hand upon his to signify the cut he still fingered, "because I wanted to make myself look how I saw myself to be. To bring out my true face, so you could see how irreparably damaged and worthless I am. And how useless I must be to you…." The flow of emotions stopped, running dry at last, and I was suddenly silent, strangely at a loss for words. I had nothing more to say, he knew it all, everything I had ever wanted him to know. I was motionless, I lost the ability to move or speak as I looked at him, watching, waiting, praying that he understood. He held nothing in his eyes, which were lost in thought, empty for the first time in many months. He was motionless as well, frozen in place, his face directed towards mine, one arm outstretched to meet the abused flesh that he now understood to be his mark, a symbol of his territory, voluntarily inflicted by me. The seconds became minutes, and still we remained the same. My fears, by that point, had run rampant in my head, and I was convinced that I had somehow completed the task I had mistakenly set out to do before, and now he really would hate me. How wrong I had been before, I truly had never wanted this. I only wanted him to see that I wanted, more than anything, to belong to him completely, if only for the short time I had left. A very selfish thing to want, but I wanted it nonetheless. I refrained from speaking, afraid that I would interrupt his thoughts or possibly anger him further. My tears came still, but the flow had lessened as I awaited his reaction, and the hand he held to my face was wet with my apology.

Then, all in one moment, his hand disappeared from my face, and he drew himself to his full stature, the way he used to, so long ago. I feared the worst at that point, but I kept silent. No matter what he had to tell me, I wanted to hear every word. His line of sight fell on my face, and his eyes were sharp, cutting me almost as deep as his words did.

"Since when did I allow you to decide what I want and what I don't? Do you think you actually understand me, could ever understand what I am, in any way?" My fears had turned for the worst, and his voice, which had begun very quietly, had slowly escalated with each word. Now he spoke in a commanding tone, but I knew that in moments it would be louder, and angrier. "Well, it's very nice of you to let me know what I think of you, but I'm afraid that I'll be calling those shots, not you. I can't believe you sometimes, how do you manage to misunderstand everything, all at once?" He finally broke his cool demeanor and let himself go, he was angrier that I had originally thought he would be, and I honestly couldn't blame him. He was right, who was I to say what he wanted or needed? I had only wanted to help him, but I had, once again, only managed to create more for him to worry about. How _did_ I manage that? Even I wanted to know. I opened my mouth to apologize, to calm him somehow, but as soon as I was found out, he raised his hand to my face, calling for silence. I gave it to him, not knowing what else could I do. I would give him whatever he asked of me, it was rare indeed that I had something for him to request. In the silence I offered up, he was silent as well. He drew a long, slow breath, and held it for a few moments before finally releasing it, and with the expelled air I also felt part of his anger follow, and he regained his composure before continuing.

"I am angry, yes, but not for the reason you may think. I am not angry with you for inflicting injury to yourself, only concerned for your safety, and unhappy because you aren't able to be happy. I am angry with you because you assumed that you knew all these things about me and how I felt, and you never asked me if they were true or not. You never said anything to me at all. Did you ever consider asking me to talk about it? If you had come to me and told me how upset this made you, I would have been able to help you. But you, you just….have to make everything worse than it already is! And you couldn't be more wrong about how I feel. Why would you think that you're useless to me? What 'use' am I supposed to get from you? Would you rather I see you for how useful you are to me? I would feel terrible if I did, objectifying you like that. Is that how you see me? Am I useful to have around?" Crying uncontrollably, I shook my head frantically, wanting to please him, but knowing it was a lost cause for the time being. I had never wanted any of this.

"Why do you say you treat me so badly, and I treat you so well? Because I have never seen that to be true, if fact, ever since I moved you out here I've felt that the opposite was the real truth. What it is that makes me so wonderful? Is it the things I could potentially buy for you? Or perhaps it's all the money I have ready at your disposal. If you think of it, tell me what it is that I've done for you, besides offer you money that you refuse to touch! I can't even get you to accept the only thing I have to give you! And still, you look at me in that way. Without a second of hesitation, you accept everything I subject you to, regardless of how it must make you feel inside, and you do it willingly, and I…I can't make this end. I've tried, but I always give in to it…." He was as silent as I was, we both knew what he had begun to refer to, he hadn't meant to bring it up. I would never hold it against him, or even speak of it, knowing that I would only cause more damage to him than he had already undergone. Some things about us were….different than they had been a few months ago. Living with Seto had showed me everything about him, both good and bad, and I found that he was not the person I thought I knew. He was more, and now that I saw the whole picture I found that this Seto was much more accessible, more human. And I had come to find that, like me, he suffered from an emptiness that he couldn't fill on his own, although unlike me, it took much more than any drug could offer for him to fill it. I let him say what he needed, and I looked at him without judgment. He continued, slightly regretful in his delivery. He lost all of the anger his voice had held, and the next words he spoke resonated with all the emptiness he held in his heart, in his mind.

"You still see me the way you always did, even though you now know that the person you saw in me never existed. Even now, while I yell at you until you're in tears, you can look at me with that expression, the one you give to no one else. Well, now you know what it is that you have to give me, the reason that I can't let you go, no matter how hard it is for me to watch you kill yourself. It's that look. I'm almost sure that you don't even know that you do it, but it drives me crazy. Your feelings are written all over your face, and whatever you've been thinking about is reflected in your eyes. I can see everything about you, and what you love the most, what occupies your every waking moment. I've looked into your eyes as often as I could ever since the very first time we met, unable to believe in what, I swear, I saw inside you, the moment I looked. I didn't believe it at first, but now, I'm not sure what to believe in. So maybe you can help me after all. I have to ask you something, but…I've been afraid, am afraid. But this has to end, now." He looked at me expectantly, not wanting to rush me, but needing to resolve once and for all whatever it was that he was desperate to know, and he seemed like he was dangerously close to the edge of something. "I've held back because I think I may have already caused you to hate me, and if I make things worse between us, you'll leave. Which I think you should, but still I won't allow you to. I refuse to let it end this way, without you ever knowing the full truth, and without asking you for the answer I want. If you knew the answer, would you tell me the truth? And even if you don't, will you promise to not run away?" He cut himself off, but his face still pleaded with mine to allow him to take this last liberty with me, while I was still in my right mind. Before I destroyed myself completely.

I was unsure of how to respond without upsetting him more, so I nodded my head and smiled, which I'm sure looked incredibly pathetic since my eyes were still running over with tears. "Anything you need that I can give to you, please, ask me for it."

He took this into his gaze and closed his eyes, refusing to say another word until he had it worked out perfectly. It didn't seem as though he had allowed himself to believe that this chance would ever come, and he was lost in the shock of the opportunity. Moments later, his eyes opened and went for mine immediately, nearly pulling me out of myself with the incredible magnetism that only his gaze had over me. Then, without any warning, he strode forward, moving with small but quick steps in my direction, and it seemed that he intended to walk right through me. I instinctively took a small step back, unsure of what to expect. Continuing just as he had been, he was unfazed by my uncertainty and remained in patient pursuit, until I felt the wall pressed into my back, signaling that I had reached the end of my rope. He had seen this outcome in advance and was already using the situation to further his goal, which I was still unsure as to what it could be. What knowledge did I possess that he couldn't just take from some other source? Before I could question his motivations any further, he finished what he had started when he had backed me to the wall, and with a quick thrust and a perfectly timed side-step I found myself tossed sideways into the corner, mere inches from the place I had been seconds before.

The entire act had been executed in a style that had tipped me off, I knew it was one of

Seto's games, the ones he would never play with anyone else but me, and I had helped him by finishing my role, submitting to his will. No one else knew him enough to even know this part of him existed, the place he couldn't fill. A place that I could, and did, whenever possible. It was random and fleeting, the urge would come over him and he would shift suddenly and without warning into another mindset, a manifestation of his ideal personality. The person he should be, he could have been, if he hadn't lost the piece of himself he had always relied upon the most. In the darkest night of his soul, the day that he lost the shadows that lived inside of him, in the illusion of avarice. He was robbed in the name of goodness and light, losing forever that piece of hate that had kept him alive and sane while the rest of his world was diseased and insane. Ever since the first day that began a long life full of sorrow, they were inside him, whispering in his mind, telling him to take control. He hadn't been affected when he should have been, escaping his fated sorrows, too composed and in control to cry.

And then in the moment the company lost its direction, he triumphed, finally rising above the ashes in what should have been his most terrified hour, when he saw the demise of the one who stood in his way. And through all of it, never falling into despair, never breaking under pressure, the shadow in his heart gave him the power he needed, the control he loved, and the dominance he desired to overcome all. And then, his heart puzzle has been broken apart, and the darkness that he owed his success, his passion, and undoubtedly his life to, were torn from him suddenly and without warning and sent to the realm of shadows, where they had come from. And he lost the will to live, not understanding how this existence was in any way better, or easier, or anything besides empty. He had lost the control and the confidence in his power that he had been dependent on to carry him through life, and now he was lost, and he could command nothing and no one, and felt the holes in himself constantly.

Until one day when he came to me, not knowing that it would happen, but finding that I was willing to be his outlet for just a moment of release. I was the only person who knew of his missing pieces, and we were much closer than we had ever thought we would be. This was almost one month after we moved into the same house, less than a week after he asked me to sleep in his bed and share his space. I said that I would, wanting to be near him at all times, but I didn't understand yet that he had a problem. I had just thought that he was acting differently around me because we had spent so much time together, while he continued to treat everyone else as he always had. But because I had moved into his house, he was afraid I would notice the dramatic switch that I would inevitably be exposed to, that wasn't triggered by anything, and came and went as it pleased. He wouldn't be able to explain, and he wouldn't be able to protect me, and he decided that if we would share a room and a bed, then I deserved a warning, at least. He knew that he wouldn't hurt me, at least not intentionally, but I would be scared of course, and think that I had done something to make him suddenly act this way, without reason or warning. And if I tried to run away, it would only drive the desire deeper, and he would be relentless. At first, I thought he wasn't as serious as he came across, and I wondered if it could actually be as real as he made it sound, could there really be two of him? The concept was strange but I hadn't given it too much thought, I was more interested in the fact that Seto had been able to tell me a thing like that. But the first time I was there with him as it came over his mind, I was so grateful that he had explained to me what was happening, because even though he had I was still terrified at the onslaught of intensity and the swiftness with which it descended upon us. The entire ordeal was actually not longer than a minute or two, but it made up for its briefness with an overwhelming severity and unpredictable nature. There was simply no way to know what would be said or done, but over time I learned how to respond in the way he was searching for and they began to happen less often. My only concern about it was the effect it had on him when he found himself again, waking as if from a dream to find me patiently playing his game, demeaning and forceful as it inevitably must be, never questioning him or blaming him for anything. I knew how it hurt him, but I was happy, I had something that he needed and I could finally show him that I was more than willing to give it to him.

Such was the situation I found myself in at that moment, when I realized that this was no longer Seto that I lived with, but I was confident in my skills and knew how to win at his game. With my body now trapped between Seto's and the corner of our room, there was nothing but a full advantage for him and he took it, swiftly taking hold of both of my hands, and before I could blink they were already locked above my head. After testing my strength against the firm grip, I realized the futility in it. His hold was immovable, and he held both of my hands in place casually by one of his own clasped around my wrists, a blatant display of the power he held over me, wanting for me to see it, and needing to see it for himself. His other hand I became aware of in the next moment as I felt something trailing up my neck, lightly dragging across the skin and heading towards my cheek, the same one that held the mark I had made for him. His hand was nearly there, and his whole body, I felt at last, was frozen like he was. Then the fire and passion of the Sun itself shone through the places the frost had taken, and the stinging fingerprints of the Snow were gone for good, melted away, and the skin they had brushed over became raised with goosebumps. The flesh he had traversed in pursuit of my face was burning in response to his touch now long gone, the path he took to cross my body now a frozen trail, visible across my neck and face, reflecting the cold and lonely moments he had spent there. I was nearly trembling in anticipation and a shade of something close to nervousness over the measures he was taking, which were questionable in purpose and seemed extravagant. This didn't resemble anything I had ever done before, with Seto or the other one, but I didn't voice my thoughts just yet, not wanting to do anything unless I had to.

Now his hand had reached it's destination, and he ran his index finger up the line of torn flesh, slowly, and seemingly deep in thought. His eyes were staring directly at the wound with a look that was lost to his surroundings, glazed and unfocused. I realized, when taking in the rest of the situation, that not only did he have my arms in check, but my entire body had followed in suit and my inability to move had spread to the farthest reaches of my form, without me knowing. I experimentally pushed upwardly with my hips using the leverage of my arms, trying to meet with the force that held me down, but none of my body was able to respond. Somehow it was held down, immovable inch for my inch, more than overmatched in both will and power. Feeling a set of eyes on mine, I glanced up and noticed the smirk that wound itself around his lips, coiled and waiting to strike. I realized that it was all Seto, his body was the invisible barrier that held my form in place. He couldn't help but enjoy watching my futile movements, as I shifted against him in my efforts to discover anything that would tip me off to his purpose. Finding every inch of my body incapable of movement, I reluctantly released my stiffened form against his in silently defeat, halfway hoping that this was what he wanted. I was confused, and I decided to wait for his call, knowing that I could draw him out with little persuasion on my part.

Invoking a demon born from the heart of Seto Kaiba did not seem like a smart plan at any point, but I wanted this done with as soon as possible, and I was willing to try anything for the person who was lost underneath. Thinking quickly, I realized my best advantage was the position he held me in, making him more accessible than usual. He almost never became as physical as he was here, which had sown the seeds of suspicion in my mind, knowing that he and Seto shared the same intentions and emotions, the only way to set them apart was their method of execution. This was why I hadn't been aware of the separation, until he revealed it to me himself. I felt him react slightly to my release of resistance, but he still waited, watching me, waiting for me, wanting me to…..do something, but what? I thought he would move in on my moment of weakness, but he hadn't, waiting for something else instead. Perhaps it wasn't the chance he was after, but the pursuit of it, the chase. It was worth a shot, as anything was at this point. He was motionless, and he watched me as I once more tried put up a fight, amused slightly but the look he had to him was one that _knew_, knew more than I thought, knew infinitely more than I had judged. Knew what I was up to, and knew what he would do in return. I froze in mid-struggle, I had a terrible feeling about this. I felt the pressure between us increase slightly, and I mentally stuttered, as he closed the distance between his body and mine, a distance that hadn't really been there. His entire form was against mine in such a way that we were nearly mirrored perfectly, my body a reflection of his, and every part of me involved in our contact was inevitably pressed to the place on his body that matched mine. I felt that there wasn't much of either one of us that wasn't involved in the contact, and I fell into the truth of the moment with that thought.

My mind blanked in a state of shock, I had no defense against this. I would inevitably be found out, and fast. For all the struggle and resistance I could put up, and all the confusion and disgust I could force out, there was no escaping the traitorous espionage that my body threatened to uncover. The aggressive and threatening advance, while almost nonexistent when considering that he hadn't actually done anything, still affected me to a surprising extent. How had he known what would do this to me, just the promise of an advance from him with that terrifying and consuming stare, the promise of my inevitable and violently stolen surrender. I wondered if I had displayed more than I meant to, this other self of Seto so intensely effective in bringing out a darker side of myself that was so compatible with his own. But none of it mattered, at least at that moment, and I realized with a growing terror that I would lose this game if it went even a moment further, and the fear was so evident in my eyes that he stopped and stared. A movement, behind the iris and then gone, taking with it the moment and reaction, the cause and effect, and I was instead suddenly ripped from my corner by a hand entangled in my hair, and dragged across the room in that manner, screaming and clawing at the source. Without any notice, the hand released it's grip, dropping me suddenly and I fell to the ground, my head making a terrible sound on the floor below that I heard before I felt. I had fallen with my face to the sky, and as I opened my eyes I saw him, nearly two of him as my vision went fuzzy momentarily with the force of impact. He stood directly above my face and he looked down upon it, meeting my mixed gaze with his own, a horrible look that held the promise of an advance from him with that terrifying and consuming stare, the promise of my inevitable and violently stolen surrender. It just wasn't fair, how could he know this broken-off splinter of me so well? His actions were nearly scripted from the echoed thoughts that could only have been stolen from my mind itself, not more than minutes ago. It was not real. I was not this torn and abused creature, not here, in reality. It had just been an indulgence in fantasy, which had been easy to fall in, with Seto's other so willing to help me develop it. No. I was not drawn to this. And my body then declared the awful truth that couldn't be denied by even I, finalizing on its own what it craved and forced my reasons aside in the name of lust. My desire was realized and I found that I responded, had already responded, and I was now torn between uncontrolled attraction and absolute terror.

I was never given the choice, however, and he refused to give me what he knew I wanted. Instead, he opted to find some other method to drive me to insanity, and biding his time, he lifted his leg closest to me and thrust the heel of his boot to my exposed neck, threatening the passage of air. I could do nothing to stop him, his will to destroy me was bewitching and draining all at once. "I can see your desire, it is written all over you face, just as obvious as your love. However, I don't think I will give you what you want just yet. I would much rather watch you suffer at the hand of the one you love the most." He used the leverage my neck gave him and pushed off with his heel, bruising me before releasing me. In a motion I didn't see before me, I was lifted completely from the ground with both of his hands in a grip on my shirt, and roughly dropped to my feet standing, only to be pulled along from behind him to a destination that confused me fully. Why would he take me in the bathroom? It wasn't far to go, and upon arrival he released me and shut the door behind us with his hands behind his back, pushing it till he heard the click, all the while watching me, smiling a smile that was far too happy for my liking. He remained against the door, watching me as I watched him. Before too long he spoke, quietly and without any of the former hostility.

"Joey…?"

I blinked at him, shocked, and saw a face of quiet misunderstanding and slowly growing fear, that looked like Seto. I smiled, a huge smile of relief and happiness at his return. He looked at me and saw my state, his face filled with curiosity at my frazzled appearance, but I shook my head, I would never tell him what had happened. There was no point, it would cause nothing but unhappiness for the both of us. I didn't want to think of what was supposed to happen in the bathroom, what would have happened if he hadn't returned at just that moment. Something was still very wrong, even though I had gotten away without any serious harm, there had never been a threat like this, or a sudden resolve to destroy rather than dominate, and I knew that something inside of Seto, my Seto, must have triggered this change.

I was lost, with no way out, and I gave in. I willingly surrendered myself, but since the Seto I knew wouldn't take it from me, I gave it to the only other dominating force that I wanted to offer myself to. I filled the empty places inside of me, and was once again taken by the ecstasy of feeling alive for no good reason. The substance once more worked itself into my body, and somewhere not far away, Seto knew that, for the first time in all his life, he had truly failed. The moment was gone, spent, and we knew that it was the last of it's kind. I was still very interested in the giving him the answer he wanted so deeply, but he couldn't ask for the answer to a question that he didn't understand, the question that I needed to hear. I thought that perhaps someday the chance would come for us to finalize what we had begun so long ago, on that day he kidnapped me, and stole the last days of my sanity.

I felt as though we were very nearly the same person, in the way that we let ourselves die, and now that we had found one another we could tell ourselves that the one we would save would be the other. And then, my thoughts ran from me and I had nothing and no one left. Seto, in the same moment, let the emptiness inside him rise above his head, and drowned as long as he was able to believe he could.

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He had been falling, falling, so sad it was but here he fell and words were heavy and he fell deeper with them, they held so little for weighing so much on a falling person and didn't he fall with the one who fell too and he knew…….

Seto, too, fell and then fell, and then felt as though he should wait for a person who fell as well as he, as fast as the passing of time that fell so fast, yet faster was Seto and he wondered why, he was empty and hollow, so fast so quick for a person to fall such as he and him who was with him and falling……

AN: Yep. I went there. And it felt so good. I had this much fun writing this chapter (I raise my arms and hold them far, far apart, signifying the depths of the universal Fun that I have indeed traversed in my journey to this, the Note of the Author), it was very tasty and strangely, a bit chewy at times. Someday, something good is going to happen, I just know it will! And when it does, I'll give it an angsty personality disorder and force it to beat on Joey. But hey! At least he has a little fun, right? He can't be sad all the time! He had to like something…..guys?…..hey…..hello? Alright, I admit to officially being too mean to poor Joey. I'm sorry, Joey. You'll forgive me, won't you? (Of course he will. And then right afterwards he'll throw himself in front of traffic for me, or something equally self sacrificing. A beautiful display of friendship.) Let us pray……


	7. falling until

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

The shadow had been permanently cast around us, foreshadowing every future event with a dark pallor, and a subtly but effectively underlying sense of sadness, and lost hope. For a long time after the day Seto's other had attacked me so hatefully, I had been frightened of Seto himself, not through any fault of his own, but just due to the aftershock that I felt, now that I knew for certain I wasn't safe with him anymore. But still, regardless of how unsafe it might have been, I stayed as close to Seto as ever, wanting to know why this change had come over his subconscience. It seemed as though I had been mistaken at the time, the assault was not a reaction from any secret feelings kept hidden from sight, exposed to me accidently. On the contrary, he sensed that something had happened that he was not a willing participant of, the moment he awoke to find me locked away in the bathroom with Seto himself blocking my exit, finding his body tensed, lying in wait. And I had been looking in his eyes with the most terrified and hopeless gaze he had ever witnessed on anyone, as though I had already been the victim of what it was that had been inevitably my swiftly approaching fate. He asked me to tell him the whole story, many times, begged me when I wouldn't, and then finally threatened to send me back to the adjacent room, all of it empty, and designed to show me how much he cared about the trouble he caused me. I didn't care how bad he wanted to know, I would take that with me to my end. I simply cared too much for him.

The other one was gone now, Seto had known for certain on that day, a short time after my narrow escape. He must have sensed that Seto would rebel against him soon, and he fled immediately. He knew what would happen to Seto's mind now, it would be cut off completely from its ability to express its non-negotiable demands and would go on starved and ignored, robbed of its only connection to Seto himself. It wouldn't be a pretty sight, and his other was glad to take Seto out in addition to himself, neither one could last long without the other, and that same day that the other broke away was my Seto's last day as well, in a sense. The day in which I learned the exact nature of the seemingly unstoppable force that Seto now suffered at the hands of, would soon be destroyed by. Earlier, in the small and simple hours of the silent morning, Seto had woken from a deep sleep in a strange way that surprised me from my chair beside the bed. I was almost never inclined to sleep because of my ever stimulated and drugged system, and I took to another more fulfilling and habit forming activity which was simply watching over him as he slept. I had a feeling of nervousness inside my heart, ever since the morning that Seto was last taken by him, not knowing that it had truly been very the last, and I feared the gripping feeling that whispered in my ear and would not be ignored. The feeling that assured me this was not the end of Seto's misery and constant struggle against his own mind. He awoke suddenly but without any motion, not even the quickening of his breath. He simply opened his eyes as though he was finished closing them, purposefully and devoid of visible emotion. I watched him closely, not fully believing he was awake. But then after a moment of silence and stonelike calm, his face turned to mine and thoughtfully considered what he would say to me, not fully aware of the entire situation as of yet. He spoke, and his voice was confused, lost, and sounded as if he were asking me if I understood what he could not.

"Joey....I...saw him go. He's left me." I didn't know who he spoke of, and I raised my eyebrows in silent questioning, awaiting his explanation. "The other one. I knew he had done something to you. Why you bothered to hide it I'll never understand, but he knew I was after him....he isnot here anymore. I feel a place inside me I swear I've never felt before....." He shuddered involuntarily and the voice that had whispered my fears into existence was gone. And I had been right all along. I watched him as he lay in our bed with that broken feeling in his eyes that I hadn't been able to prevent. No matter how long I had felt it, I couldn't do a thing to save him. Just as he hadn't been able to find a way to save me. But now I understood why he was still trying, even now he still fought my addiction, and I felt that I would be just as relentless as he was. And we would chase each other around in circles this way, with each complete turn descending a bit farther in a slow and playful race that spiraled hopelessly towards our certain and predetermined death. A death that we would share together as we has shared life.

Sometimes in passing, I thought back to the time that his other had tried to destroy me, still not understanding what had changed this outlet of his into a destructive and misused ability that was inevitably stripped from Seto's mind. Now Seto, feeling the absence more with each moment, understood how necessary the other one had really been, and felt his control slipping constantly from his grasping, desperate hands . I knew what he was missing but no matter how many ways I tried to explain to him how to accept what I had given him through the other, he simply did not understand. His mind and soul were missing important links between them, wires that connected his heart to his mind and were impossible to replace. I had the power to save him but he was no longer able to be saved, his lines had been severed. His heart had the same empty places that cried out to be filled, but the cries were lost in the darkness of his mind, which could no longer hear nor respond to the dying place inside him. Slowly over time, the empty places would fall into themselves, triggering a chain that would take out each and every remaining piece of his heart puzzle, until only his body was left, an empty place where he had once been, but wasn't anymore.

So I stayed with him at every moment in time, as close to his side as physically possible. Seto had been missing work for weeks now, the importance it once held for him lost in the shifting priorities and thought processes that would be constantly changing until they were all gone, and Seto would be lost inside for good. I'm sure that the terrible empire was crumbling beyond repair in his absence, but neither he nor I cared at this point.

He continued to slowly fall as I did, both of us together towards our end. I desired no other destiny than to die with Seto as I had lived with him, thinking of no one and no other fate. Seto too, saw the foreseeable end, now much closer than ever before. He resigned himself to the fate we had decided was best, unconsciously accepting and trusting my judgement in the fading traces of his own. He was by no circumstances going insane or becoming someone else, his end was easier than those would be to bear, but still devastatingly real and catching up to me with each passing day. He began to forget things, silly things at first which made no difference or even went totally unnoticed. But time takes so much from a person who's fate was Seto's, and we had spent another five months since the last appearance of Seto's other one, now having been living together for nearly a year. The time we spent there was undoubtedly the most worthwhile in both of our short lives, but still, it was then and gone, and the passing of time had been cruel to Seto. The most common theft upon his heart had been memories, not even close to all of them by a long shot, but more and more turned up unaccounted for as the days we spent together drew to a close. Also under assault was his self confidence and his terrible ego, after three of the now five months that had left us, he had been almost fully relieved of both. Watching the deterioration of Seto happening before me, not able to escape or ignore it, I had voluntarily taken on the end that fate had forced upon him. I pushed at the boundaries of my addiction, slowly building my tolerance higher, and along with it my sense of separation from reality, only knowing what was real between Seto and I. What else did I need to concern myself with? He and I lived each day as it came, looking distantly at, but never forward towards death, seeing it but uninterested for now, there would be time later for all of it.

And then suddenly, without warning, Seto decided to spit in the face his predetermined fate and simply walked away from it. It was as simply executed as I put it. He was staring at me, as he had begun to do more and more commonly, each time the gaze became longer and more confused, as if trying to recall something so long forgotten that even the memory of the knowledge he once had was gone forever. He still would respond to anything I asked him, and from time to time would ask me questions that were mysterious in origin, concerning things like the time before I came to live with him, how we had spent it, how we had fought constantly, in our attempt to disguise the hidden feelings underneath. The time line in his memory leading up to my kidnaping had been affected dramatically, but strangely and without explanation, the entire story of the ten whole months I had been there with him was perfectly intact, as though nothing was wrong with him at all. I had suspected this would be the case since the beginning, knowing he would spend every last second of his life defending his memories of what we had come to be in the extremely short amount of time that life had allotted us to spend with one another. It was a cold defeat that no one could have prevented, but our time wasn't spent in anger, we had since decided to spend our time like it had all been a dream, and we were both alive and well. But now these staring sessions that I had noticed would last hours out of the day, and I wondered what he was doing inside himself for all that time. He was thinking, I could see it in his eyes, but about what, I could not say. We would lie on our bed, I would relax and chat with him while he would just stare at me, directly into my eyes. Almost as if he could see through them and beyond, into me as I was, am, will be. Into my soul, which was nothing but a piece of a soul that had been torn in two, in an awful and critically wounding way, so that even now that we found the impossibly hidden person who carried the other piece, we now bled to death together as one, instead of all alone in the empty cold.

One particular day we had been spending in that lazy way, enjoying each other's company as I talked about random things to cheer him up, while hestared as he did before, as he did now almost every day. I couldn't tell him to stop, it was a desperate thing he was doing, and I feared the worst, maybe this was it, I thought to myself. Maybe he was beginning to finally slip away completely. But to my surprise and disbelief, as he stared into me that day, I took a chance and looked back into him, returning his look, and seeing what I had feared to be the end, andthat wasnot what it was at all. I couldn't have been more wrong. The beginning was what truly lay in him, waiting to strike the moment that he knew could set it into motion. I gazed deeper, into him, and I saw a glimpse of his purpose, which he called out to me through his stare, silently waiting for me to see his intent, waiting for me to say that it was all right. I was at a loss, his personality was still intact, he had been purposely letting his mind take the pieces of himself he would no longer have a use for, as the true Seto Kaiba would, calculating and scheming until the very end. All he needed for his victory were his memories of he and I, and his will was sure to succeed in the end.

There weren't words I knew that could convey the feelings he gave to me that day, relighting the fire from a sad and lonely ember once though lost under the ashes, left for dead. He always had the power to ignite my passionate feelings for him, no matter what I had felt before, it was always lost in the inevitable blaze that was sure to follow in our wake. The very first moment of contact between us, we met as two complete strangers, and then were passionate and dedicated adversaries, in a matter of mere seconds. The sparks physically flew in the moments that we were engaged, in either a heated argument or a duel, both of which were driven by an unseen force that was far more foreboding than anyone could have guessed. It was the raging fire inside of us, created by us, the all-consuming passion with which he forcefully sought out my soul, the only source of receptive power that could feed the furiously projective flames of Creation, which in return spawned within my own soul the ever spiraling rebirth of the blazing force that was Destruction itself, born from his insatiable sacrifice again and again. The circle was completed and would never have anything but a perfect completion within. I embodied the perfectly mirrored force that was the polar opposite to his, and our intense magnetism pushed and shoved one another in a eternally self perpetuating exchange of power.

And somehow, I had nearly let my fire go out, too close to releasing the original spark that would be all I could keep of the power that Seto had over me and caused me to have, all at once. It would be longer still, five months had run from us nearly unnoticed, but we had life left in us, and he had much more of himself that I had believed. He looked at me as always, now an angry ember burning directly under the already white and blue flames that were impossibly contained in his eyes, and their slight shift in color betrayed the temperature of the fire in his soul. It was a frozen flame, the balanced extremes of fire and ice somehow burning at once, the melting destruction of heat and the furious penetration of the cold stood together, freezing any fears or doubts in his mind immediately, while his soul was purified in the flames. He was unbelievable, where had he been hiding all of this? How could I have not seen...any of this coming?

It was simply because he was Seto Kaiba. THE Seto Kaiba, mind you. How many times had been considered dead in the past? I couldn't even recall all of them anymore. It seemed that he was almost irritatingly impossible to kill, an unstoppable Phoenix that promptly and casually strode away from the ashes importantly, immediately too busy with his own life to notice that you had tried to end it. Completely and effortlessly able to be disinterested in anything at all, and a rather bad habit of saying what he truly meant to say, to everyone, all the time, and then walking away in a cloud of superiority, and no one had ever done a thing, since the dawn of Seto himself. All of this and much more, unconsciously executed with a superior class and style that commanded organized disbelief and respectful amazement at Seto, the miracle that just wouldn't quit. It was an absolutely, inevitably, and ever truthfully spoken fact, he was relentless, he just kept coming back, and repeated efforts always resulted in madness. Attempting to rid oneself of Seto Kaiba was ridiculously dangerous in a deep and underlying sense of the word, and should be avoided at all costs.

He was seizing this moment, asking me for my approval, my permission. Before he could do anything he needed me to say that I was alright, that he could go, and I would be fine on my own until he returned. I said yes. I wouldn't dream of standing in the way of a person as powerful and stubborn as he was, even I had been changed by his mere presence, once he revealed it to me. He wanted my permission to give him one final chance to finish what he had started, permission I had given once before, that last day I spent as myself and no other, my drugs momentarily missing in action. I had offered him the chance to ask me for the answer he needed before he could accept the fate I had wanted, to let myself die. All he wanted was the moment of truth that my sobriety had offered, on that day only, and then his other had taken both his body and his most desperate hour, and then had run away afterwards, taking whatever was left, leaving Seto nothing but the broken body and a stolen mind, irreplaceable and now near dead. Or so I had thought. But the Seto that stood, upon hearing my answer, was the same one I had been with this whole time, all these months, and he was living out the last part of his life doing what he had always wanted, and what he had always knew he would finish, deep down. I watched him as he stood off the bed we shared, and he looked at me for a long time, driven as a person who was mad, and I knew was Ithe purpose to this, it was for my sake that he burned away the remaining places in him, sacrificing them to the fire, in the selfless way that he had always done for me. However driven by power and love his force was, there was the inevitable end that would not be brought by death, but by the final piece of himself falling out of the light, out of what had been his heart. No miraculous and death defying comebacks could rescue him from the destruction that was already becoming evident within him, when considering the almost completely deserted wasteland that had been his memory of times passed much before my hour. But he gave them all up in willing succession, all in order of the importance and relevance that Seto had assigned to certain events, people, and ages, all systematically devised during the time he had to wait for the right moment, when he'd collected all the will and strength that he could hold within his remaining pieces of himself.

Not only was he more than infused with the determined drive that I could feel and see in his eyes, his gaze that was as terrifyingly real as the flames that hid within, giving him the power that he would have otherwise been forced to leave behind, if only for a short while. I believed in him. I believed that he would find a way to rescue me from myself, a hope that had never died, once I found it inside me. It was there, and it was nearly gone, but the returning fire of my soul filled the glow of the flames, all that there was, illuminating everything with a brilliant light and it was hopeful, and I had never been. I began to cry, out of so many places inside, and he could not stay to help me, every second he had would never return again. He was standing in front of the bed that I had never stood off of, and still wouldn't, deciding in a second that I would remain there, awaking only at the sound of his arrival, for nothing and no one else. He leaned over me and smiled, which I hadn't seen in such a long time, and it was still as beautiful and honest as ever. He believed in him, just as I did. Which was always the deciding factor in tests of love and determination and life. His smile was open and I fell right in, drowning in the quieted and calmly blazing extensions of his will, and they took me in as I tumbled forward, into sleep and rest, and to pass the lonely time. I did fall into a deep sleep, so far in his depths that I never really fully escaped, and upon waking found that he was not there. I remembered the touch, the sensation that alerted my swiftly escaping mind that I felt something, and it's touch felt like Seto's, and it was, as Seto left he made a silent wish for my safety and my hope, that it would hold strong beneath his, because I was the single source of hope, and power, desire, and everything else that he had taken into himself. I was the reason that he had this reason to try, this final burst of life that he would eventually burn into nothing, and be done and gone forever. But even if he failed, failed in every attempt and every goal, came back broken and empty handed, and fully spent at last, I would still be happier than ever before. Because I would have been the reason he stood up and fought. Seto never sat down in defeat, regardless of what sort of demise had currently befallen him. Yet for a moment, he was planning to do just that, because it was what I wanted for us. To live as quietly and as long as possible, calmly accepting defeat, and very literally lying down where we stood and proceeding to die in haste. But he just couldn't do it. Even for me, he couldn't just die quietly like that, it wasn't inside of him. Somewhere outside of me, Seto had leaned in to my sleeping face, finding bliss within the rest he had forced me to succumb to, finally. He studied it momentarily, and then decided to be off, and quickly. He had a hell of a lot to do, and not much heart left to use. Silently promising to punish me for it later, he quickly gave in and placed his lips swiftly and with little pressure on the middle of my forehead, which I later remembered and now can fondly describe this way, knowing Seto.

He was still Seto Kaiba, a name whichshould technically strike a frigid fear in the hearts of all who had experienced the power in his mere presence, regardless of how long it had been since he had shown his face in his own office. Well, it had better strike something in them when he walked in there. He grinned inside his head, oh, how quickly they would fall to their knees, unable to understand with their weak and feeble minds, but in awe of Seto. Wondrous at his brilliant and miraculous return, once again defying death and destruction, for at least awhile. He had time, and plenty of it. He could safely say that he held a solid week in his grasp, which was more than enough time to get this business with his company settled once and for all, even with the news that he was going to unleash on them, and then walk out the door, leaving a state of blind panic in his destructive path. He had been randomly keeping tabs on the cumbersome thing, finally sick of it at last, it had become more trouble than it was worth, and he had been planning on rebuilding the whole thing again, until the last echoing laugh of Fate had fallen upon his ears. Again. He was growing very tired of being the only person that was still being repeatedly and unfortunately 'chosen' by Fate, to be tied up to those senseless and blindly trusting fools that groveled in the dirt at the very utterance of the concept Fate. Seto was always sticking it to Fate whenever they were in earshot, just so he could laugh in their innocent little faces when they nearly cried because Seto "was being mean," Amusedly mocking both them, and their undying patience for Fate to 'get it together'.

Seto would do anything to come out alive, shamelessly and fully determined to not die,always saying, "not just yet." And most certainly, not at the hands of Fate. Absolutely unacceptable, he thought with distaste in his mouth and mind, thinking of all the times he had triumphed in some way, overcoming impossible odds and succeeding in once and for all proving that only Seto made Seto's choices. Even in the face of an obvious reality they would cling to their ridiculous lie, instead changing the story around to fit their purposes, that Fate had decided it, or Fate had chosen him, or something else completely transparent and far fetched involving Fate, who evidently provided everything for anyone who was ever 'chosen' by it's almighty pointed finger. It was funny, Seto had realized awhile back, how this 'Fate' who was a seemingly all knowing and seeing entity who was never mistaken, would repeatedly choose, out of all the world, the same band of idiots time and time again, to do the bidding of, and undoubtedly the 'dirty work' for, Fate. And he always found himself, out of the rest of the world, as the sole individual that would, until further notice, fill in for the role of instigator. Meaning the bad guy, but since he had no desire to harbor an elusive and inexplicable 'power to rule the world', he would have to do, until a real one had been located and inserted into the rolehe was evidently not generically insane enough to fill. Well, Seto was finally going toadvise Fate to go and instigate itself, and that was that.

He continued thinking about everything that he was going to do, and his thoughts grew heavier and less amusing, but everything would finally work out the way he wanted it to. And Joey would, hopefully, respond to the question, the question that Seto still had to work out completely, but he knew that he had learned the secret to the asking, and was, underneath the insults and angered thoughts, so very nervous, at the moment which was before him. He would be nervous until it was done, but it would be the only thing he could do for Joey, and he wanted to show him, even if it killed him, what he had always wanted more than anything in the world.

AN: i don't have too much left to say,I just said a lot of stuff here, AndI still cant understand how my words get used up like that. I must be wasting too many words. Uh, if you can tell what the end is going to be, take your best shot! I DARE YOU TO KNOW!!!!


	8. we're falling together

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

Do not cry, my children. I will not make you suffer that much. This is almost over, and then the pain will end....maybe....unless I write another story right after this, which I might do. Because I was thinking while I was supposed to be working, about Seto and Joey, and I realized that when this is over, my life will be this empty shell. Kinda like Seto, heh heh........(that is not funny, I'm sorry!) A lot of people took a stab in the dark, trying to guess the question _in question_ (HA!), and no one got it. I was impressed, however, at the incredible variety of endings that sounded feasible to me, as well as great potential for newer and sadder stories. And some of them, I have to say, were very tempting, such as Seto asking Joey to marry him before they died, which was SO ROMANTIC that almost died, and then I wanted to delete Seto's real question, for a moment. Another time, another story, because the tension between them only grows, and I thank the powers that be. But it was so romantic, I just.......can't............breathe.........aaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Here begins the end.

He pushed me and I am falling......still. He is falling...somewhere else.......and it all seems to fly by.............

He pushed me, and I am falling…no. No, that's not what happened. He touched me, and I fell. I fell into this dream. It's so strange. This sort of thought, that I am aware of.... I know I'm asleep. He put me here. Because he is gone, and he will return to me soon. I hope that he wants to ask me for what I so deeply desire to give him.

I hope he knows the depths of what I hold inside, a place for him that waits eternally.

I hope that he feels the same regret that I feel. We never became complete together.

We felt the same way about each other. Why did we do nothing?

Did I imagine it all? Was it always just me?

Would I ever find out.....? Not if I kept falling. Falling, down, down, away from the answers, away from him, away from the us that never came to be. It was so sad. We were followed relentlessly by each of our own downfalls, and yet were preoccupied with that of the other. Reaching to each other in the dark and feeling nothing, yet refusing to simply turn on the light above. How simple things were, now that they had come to a close. How foolish we both were.

Now that I was inside, looking outwards at he and I, I saw every chance, every moment that we could have said 'let's stop this', and just look at the way we were, it would have made all the difference. I wondered if he felt the regret I felt, in those memories that we shared.

And how badly I hoped, hoped to all I was and he as well, I sent my hope to Seto, as he had asked me to, and I hoped that he would receive it well.

And my final hope was the last thing I would have thought it would be, if I had been asked when Life stretched out endlessly before he and I, before these last days fell through our fingers and were carried off by the gusts of rebirth. But the experience of looking at death through the face of the one I loved most had brought me to a painfully basic and emotionless reality, a world without color or sound, but represented the core of my existence. Thought was effortless and almost tangible here, and the thought that came to me before any other was unexpected, to say the least. But I knew it as I had all along, if I had been more able to see the truth beyond all reason.

I hoped for life. And it plagued my sleep with dreams of moments we shared, caught up in the passion of life, spending time freely in all honesty, the best and most treasured moments of our connected hours.

It was a hope based on nothing. A hope somehow born from the absence of hope. I carried it nonetheless, it was my pure intention for he and I to have lived a part of our time as we both wished we had. We were lost, and there were so many hidden exits we had stumbled upon along the way, but were blinded in the shadows of one another's sorrow.

It was not too late. It was never too late. There was always hope, and I held it within me.

My dying wish.

My dying gift to him alone.

The hope born from the two of us. But there had never been a two of us, and the hope had yet to be conceived, and I was falling as well...........

I wouldn't wake for a thing…

Into another dream. A dream of thoughts and feelings from another lifetime…

..... _I closed my eyes and said it with my voice. "I'm in love with him." It sounded gorgeous, and I loved the way the words felt on my tongue. I decided, a long time ago, that this feeling would have to be enough. He would never feel for me the way I do for him...... _

(I felt this once, it was so long now…this person was not the real me.)

"_Seto, will you please escort Joey to the nurse?" _

(I remember that, I was so scared. If the teacher had chosen someone else, I wonder...)

"_Get in the car. Now." _

(Seto. Shocked at what he had learned, the moment he knew.)

...._Seto laughed quietly next to me. "I take it you like it, then? Well, that's good, because this is where you stay from now on. So close your mouth." He spoke with his usual rude and commanding tone, but underneath it there was a hint of something that told me he wore a smile_

(He kidnapped me. I remember feeling so excited and so terrified. I didn't know how different everything would be. I died that day, the old me. I sound so different, so young, as if I've aged a thousand years since then.)

"_I don't really know why you've been doing them. And I can't fully explain why I need you to stop. ButI don't want you to die. And you are dying. Very slowly, yes, but killing yourself slowly is a very selfish thing to do. I can see you dying, right here. Every time you use, you die a little bit more. Watching you today made me realize that" He began to act upset, not with anger, but with helplessness, a concept he did not fully understand. This was a situation he had no control over, and he did not know how he could seize that control…. _

(I wonder if that was the other. After Seto spoke his mind and realized his helplessness. Perhaps he wasn't acting upset, maybe he was gone for a moment. It didn't matter at all. Seto was able to be himself fully without fear now.)

_We were exceptionally compatible with each other, especially when it came to playing house, which amazes me to this day why we didn't see it sooner. Our life in his house was happy. Happy may not seem like a very expressive word to describe the rightness I felt being next to him at all times, but it was a feeling I had been searching for. And this was the only place I was ever able to find it, so I give it the proper credit it deserves. He and I were happy...._

(We never said a word. I would put regret from my mind, but still I saw where we fell short in fear.)

I was able to see more of the way things really were, between Seto and I. I could now see that his soul and mine were more than coincidentally similar. It was like finding a person whose fingerprints were the same as yours. However, the both of us only owned small bits and unfinished pieces of the same whole, which could only be created by a unified effort from the two of us, together. He owned the other piece of me...

(I was empty still. The knowledge was new then, and promising, but was left unused and collected dust in the absence of our shared desire to move higher together as one. Instead we followed the path that was flat and smooth, with no hills or rocky places, and ended where we started out from. Traveling farther and farther together, but leveled at a permanent altitude and unable to climb even a foot higher, winding farther still until the end was revealed as the beginning, and we now saw our path would never take us anywhere. Here my hope was found.)

_I looked like a drug addict. I was hideous. No wonder I hadn't been able to catch Seto's eye on my own. I had tried up until now to push the idea to the back of my head, but there wasn't anything to hide behind now. Seto was intense to look at. He certainly wasn't handsome, but he wasn't pretty either. He was lost somewhere between the two, not favoring masculine nor feminine features, instead embodying both. The most attractive features from both sexes were perfectly balanced into a single person, and the end result was breathtaking. And impossible to tear my eyes from....._

(I was so lost. And I hurt him and me both. I remembered, though, these memories were so very important me, and I would never stop remembering. No matter what.)

Feeling an unquestionable trust in him, I melted myself further into the body beneath my own, completely relaxing every muscle in my body, until I could no longer feel where he ended and I began. I hadn't ever done anything like that before, but with him, it was a moment that I realized I had been searching for, not even fully aware of it.

(I thought back, to all moments we owned, we had never once even kissed. I wish that I had, looking back I saw that he was obvious in his returned feelings for me. It wasn't that way at the time...or perhaps we were afraid of it. So busy trying to save one another that neither of us rescued anyone, and instead fell together.)

I believed in him. I believed that he would find a way to rescue me from myself, a hope that had never died, once I found it inside me. It was there, and it was nearly gone, but the returning fire of my soul filled the glow of the flames, all that there was, illuminating everything with a brilliant light and it was hopeful, and I had never been...

(And I hoped that he could rescue himself as well. I would give him all the hope I had in me. But I could interfere no more, and I slept, lost in these times that were so beautiful and shined so bright in the shadows ever abundant in his absence. They were all around me and inside me, blinding extensions of our soul that was still sadly in two, and all the attraction and desire in the world couldn't force us to accept one another and complete ourselves as one.)

I was not tired any longer. But I wouldn't wake for anything. Anything, save the echoing footsteps that would bring him back, for good and ever. Until that very moment, I would be feeding the place inside that waited for him, filling it with the hope that he had asked me to hold strong. The closest place in the world, reserved for him alone and the many faceted flames that I held inside, reflecting my whirlwind of feelings that were ever present and constantly burning. They were equal in purity and intensity, existing only to be given up when he came to exchange them with his own, if ever it was to happen. I grew lonely from dreaming, and retired into the stillness of our room, listening with infinite patience. And the silence was heavy, holding my eyes closed, slowing my breath, casting it's spell, to be broken only with the harsh and frozen touch of his skin, signaling his final return, calling me back from our memories.

falling…and he caught my eye, I watched him fall closer…….and not as quickly….slower…

Seto stood as still as he could, and made no noise at all. He was frozen, stiffly upright and tense, staring at the door before him. The door to our room. I lay inside, knowing nothing of the world outside, living out my days in dreams. But he was here now, and he could bring me back, which was his first intention. However, he would first have to open the door….

One hand on the doorknob, and one clenched in a fist of tension, he slowly bent forward until his pale forehead rested against the door, closing his eyes and willing himself to walk inside. It had been done countless times before, with or without me inside, and up until that point it hadn't been an issue. But he feared that it would be the last time, and he was afraid, as well as nervous as all hell. At least he was still alive, and felt very well, considering the circumstances. It had taken him nearly three days to tie up all the loose ends of his life and work, so many useless papers to sign, papers that would no doubt be filed away forever, yet he had been forced to waste what little time he had shuffling through each and every one of them. It was unavoidable, and he wanted to make sure I would be safe, even if he might not be around to personally see to it. Since every possible outcome of this day stretched infinitely in all directions, he had taken many precautions, allowing for every foreseeable future. His aim, however, was directed at a single end, the destiny he felt was best for the both of us. It shook him deep, where his feelings took root within, knowing he would have to show me every inch of his existence, and he was so afraid of rejection. But it made absolutely no difference whatsoever. Seto was firm, he would not back away. There was nothing and nowhere to back into. His short time closed in all around him, but he felt no pressure and no fear from its approach, it moved nothing as of yet and Seto had a promise to keep. The only priority was his time spent with me now. He had made sure of that, there was nothing that demanded his attention but his starving and slowly dying heart, and me. But his heart, in the end, was my responsibility.

Seto was overcome suddenly with a giddiness that was like that of an anxious young boy confessing for the first time his affection for another. It wasn't all that far from the truth. Adrenaline rushing through him like a drug, he pushed open the door with a burst of excitement at the promise of seeing me after what seemed like forever, and stepped into the light of day.

falling… but I feel his fall…..so near to me as I fall as well….fall at the same speed…..so slowly

He was close now. I felt him as he drew nearer with each second, pausing for a few moments when he was very nearly upon me. I felt as though Seto were afraid of something, and he remained still for a while longer. Then all at once, a rushing motion swept around my mind where it lay dormant in my soul, and I felt him in a way I never had. He hadn't been noticeable, only my knowledge of how he felt had shown him to me, but this…. This was a person who was not afraid of himself, and accepted what he did, what he would do now. Confident in the things he felt, and felt so strongly that I thought I could see the soul that owned them approach as though I watched every physical step with wide and open eyes. He entered the room at last, sealing my fate in his determined will to have it finally, what he wanted. Not just the answer, but first the confession, to have it off of him at last, hung in the air between them and finally lifted from his soul already heavy with its own weight. Finally, he could live this out, what he had gone over and over in his mind for what was a short time, but so much more to Seto in the repetition of his desires acted out at last. Coming into the room, his face was already fixated on the bed I then slept in, asleep but still nearly trembling in anticipation, I missed him so much and now he was so close, it was strengthened to the point of madness.

Seto, looking for long moments into my face that was so rested from the state I had remained in, stricken for a moment before forcing his body to approach our bedside, planning on bringing me back. He knelt beside the bed where I had remained since the moment he left, and noticed this fact for the first time, hoping that I was still all right, and not lost or suffering inside. I looked so much better than I ever had, and he realized that there was no drug that could be in my system for this long. The natural cleansing of my body, accompanied by the long and healing rest my body had taken in the time he had passed outside, had dramatically shifted my appearance. I still looked just as I always had as Joey, but the restorative measures had lifted the look of unnatural craving that was usually swimming beneath the surface of my features, and the inescapable pallor of eternal nausea and malnutrition was nowhere to be seen. He found, for the first time, that my skin was not pale at all, it was actually bright, so much that it shone through in tiny rays of sunlight that filtered through and matched my hair that fell onto my face. My features were relaxed and expressionless in rest, no longer oppressed and hidden beneath the overcast clouds of addiction.

This is the sight of me through Seto's eyes, told through him because I was sleeping in the moments that he felt and thought this about me, and was unable to wake me at first because he simply wouldn't. He was rather enjoying the view from above, and he took the image into his mind in the deepest and most detailed reflection of that moment, I seemed more alive than anyone Seto had seen before, more alive than he had ever been himself. He did not find me to be more attractive now that I was sober, but he found that the sight of my new state lifted a haze from his mind that had been gripping him with a constant worry. He hadn't been aware of how alike I was to the actual feeling that Seto could recognize as my presence without a doubt. The feelings that he felt from inside me, the flames that were gold and orange and burning, they burned brighter than the sunlight that shone in through the window behind Seto, laying itself quietly across my face and form, leaving Seto in a shadowy darkness all his own. There was nothing about the two of them that was not a fierce opposite, Seto considered thoughtfully as he wondered if he should stop staring at some point and get on with it. But he was already on with it, in a way. He wouldn't stop himself from taking what he wanted ever again, and whether he suffered or achieved ecstasy he would not deny another feeling he ever had. They were more precious than he had realized.

"And just as strong as his are", Seto thoughts came alive as he saw and felt the intensity with which I cried out to him with my affection and desire, never spoken aloud but screaming incessantly in a silent and overwhelming voice that was more audible to Seto than he let on. Or at least, until now. Still kneeling beside me, he set his face with determination and leaned slightly over, reaching out over the bed to me and turning my head so I faced him, unseeing. One of his hands slipped under the sunny bangs that fell in my closed eyes, pulling them over and off of my face. The other hand rested on my cheek, and with the skin on his fingertips he could feel the traces of a healing scab, and he shut his eyes momentarily, how did he feel about this….? Listening to the true feelings inside him was a concept that required a bit of effort on his part, having happily and spitefully walked all over his conscience it for the last seventeen years, crushing it down until it no longer tried to come back. Now that he wanted for it, it happily and spitefully remained crushed, refusing to offer up free information and forcing Seto to retrieve his own feelings by himself.

He followed the trail of injury up and down slowly, taking in the memory and emotions underneath with the tip of his finger, drawing them in and testing his own feelings against them in contrast. He wasn't hurt, or angry….he was sad, but that wasn't the one that pushed up above the others…..he felt as if I had done this for a few reasons that were, in light of the mindset he had found me in, somewhat unnoticed by me, and instead projected on to other, more intensely felt reasons that might chase me into a corner like this. He decided that he felt _undecided_, at least until I revealed myself, but he still held a deep suspicion. He guessed that I had decided that I wasn't good enough for him to return his affection openly, and instead of growing dissatisfied with the relationship that never progressed, I became dissatisfied with myself. Holding it inside me was too much, and he supposed that I then had to express my unnoticed feelings in some way, resulting in a desired game that I wanted Seto to play with me, played alone on myself. Seto smirked at my seemingly innocent face, as pure as the light it emitted, or at least, appearing that way. He knew better, and his smug and satisfied grin would have gotten something thrown at it, had I been there to defend myself. With that sort of information about the nature of the games I wanted him to play, Seto could cause a lot of trouble….

……….are we still falling….I see you and you see me but the darkness……..is still and silent…

I felt him so near to me, I knew he would come back. Why wasn't he waking me up? Did he know how? I didn't even fully understand, I just knew that it would be him alone that could do it. Beside me, he was silent and still, I waited because I had to, but I would have thrown myself into him if I could have. Then, I felt something that seemed like it was in a faraway place, so distant from where I really was. The touch was his without a doubt, it was cloudy and dark, and frozen from within, and I saw the small and stormy rainclouds that followed Seto indefinitely, hanging directly over his head alone and raining on his parade, time and time again. I laughed in my mind, he was such an overdramatic priss that it seemed to extend into his very presence, pettiness and eternal dissatisfaction drizzling behind him, leaving a misty trail that was impossibly difficult and rude. I couldn't even physically see him and his attitude was making me laugh, and I noticed that I could not laugh aloud, or use my voice at all. Nothing at all was under my possession, I could not move nor speak. I wanted to wake soon.

I wondered what he was doing over there. Was he staring at me? I thought I felt his eyes on me, an unmistakable chill that grazed my face and neck. The longer he held me in his gaze, the less transparent his emotions became, and they began to take the form of thoughts in my mind, echoing in a language I now understood. He saw the way I felt about him, he took it and gave it form, making it somehow more real with his and my belief in it at once. I was fighting against the patience I trapped myself under, I wanted out. I needed to know what he was doing, so still and quiet beside me, but causing me to react so intensely and I called his name as loud as I could, casting it away, waiting for a return. His mind heard me, I felt him withdraw in a panic, probably thinking he'd lost it at last. But then he realized it was my voice that sought him out, stirring him from his thoughts and begging him to release me from my dream.

Seto, upon realizing that the voice belonged to me and not, well…..something else, had been startled back into reality, and saw that I had not moved at all. What he had though was my waking realization had actually been my desperate and lonely cry to help me come back. He hadn't known that it was something he had to do, and he remembered that I had decided to sleep in his absence, and wouldn't wake until his return. Seto came into motion, the hand on my face moved down, slipping off and down my neck, reached my shoulder and closed around it, while his other hand mirrored it on the opposite shoulder. He shook me slightly, once and then again, stirring absolutely no movement from my body whatsoever, dead weight in his hands. He suddenly froze for a silent second, then leaned his ear to my lips and held all thoughts and functions where they stood, counting in his mind. ….After a few moments he fell back into place on the floor, sighing an outpouring of relief. What if I'd been gone, all that time, he thought, and then became angry with the thought, frowning down at it in superiority, and standing up in huffy sort of way that only he could do without appearing immature. Climbing over the mattress, he made his way to where I slept and leaned back to sit on his feet, his hands still on the bed before him, offering support. With the leverage of his arms, he bent his head down and closer, to look at my face in detail, watching for signs of life. I still seemed to be in quite deep, and he considered his options carefully. What suspicious recipe for my awakening could call for Seto as the main ingredient and manage to _not_ result in an effectively compromising and experimental situation? He vaguely sensed that he had stumbled into a very strange and slightly promising turn of events, if he laid his cards correctly.

He tried again, this time using his voice along with the original plan of jostling me, and combined the two at once. Which I am now glad was never successful, because it would have been a really irritating way to wake up, even though it was Seto Kaiba doing the jostling. At any rate, he saw the futility and quit for good, now stacking up the remaining options. In all honesty, there wasn't much else he could see as being more effective than what had already failed. Underneath the surface of the pooling reality, I heard and felt everything that happened to my body, as though it were far above me, just beyond the ripples that spread outwards infinitely, struck into motion from the vibrations caused by Seto's attempts to pull me out. There wasn't any way that I could rise to the surface on my own, he would have to reach in and pull me out. I had been drowning for too long now, and had lost my sense of how it felt to live in a place where Time was a constant factor, as well as Motion, here there was only thought, and the navigation through memories and feelings was directed by will. Willing my eyes to open would not work, physical motion required a number of factors that I didn't remember how to uncover or trigger. So I remained as before, and Seto remained puzzled. He figured that if I could call him so that he could hear me, then it must be easy for me to hear him, which was mostly true, although it wasn't easy I was listening. It came through a filter, a translator of sorts, that carried his thoughts and feelings into my mind and passed by in a symbolic phrase, so deep in my mind that I was beyond the concept of communication and language, there was no need here. I understood all that happened, seeing Seto and a mix of many things all together at once, the strongest being Failure, and then shortly after it Worry, Fear, Anger, Desire, and finally, Hope. He was very difficult to sort out into any sort of order, but I understood that he was having trouble finding me. But I still couldn't do a thing for him. I didn't know what to do either.

Seto, not being one to give up, remained calm and assessed the problem as it was. If I could hear him, maybe he could talk to me and….The idea led to nothing, there wasn't anything to be accomplished by the two of us having a nice conversation. He was still leaning forward on his arms, and he felt them start to tremble with the strain. Leaning backwards off of them, he sat upright momentarily before collapsing sideways, now lying alongside me so that we were still faced to each other, sharing a common pillow. A moment such as this was Seto's weakness, as I was asleep and couldn't do a thing, he was free to stare or speak or whatever he felt like doing, to my dismay or liking. So close were our faces, I could very nearly feel his breath in my mind, and I did respond to that. The breath that I felt was at that same moment tingling my face, the skin on it The remembrance of cold along with the picture of Seto did flick a small switch inside, and I pieced them together and felt….a sensation on my face…my cheek. Which rang a bell in response to the word cheek, I remembered having one of those….

My face was as close to his as he would allow, for the moment. He just stared, wondering what it was that held me down inside, trying to imagine what it must be like for me, thinking about how I was feeling, if I was scared…. It must be like drowning, he concluded, and it was indeed just like drowning, only falling into an easier and less painful place. But a place that I wasn't meant to live in, only reflect and regret, and then return to the place where I did belong. Not immediately, but after a minute or so of Seto and I lying close like that, faces not far apart, he saw a brief but real movement dash across my features, struggling to break free. He blinked and tensed at once, but he didn't do anything yet, fearing he would stop doing whatever it was that he had finally gotten right. Thinking fast, racking his mind, back and forth, he saw only the distance between them as the differential factor since before. Anything was worth a shot, and he raised himself up on one arm and shifted closer still, much closer than before but not yet closing the space completely. Sorting himself out, he realigned his body to mine, so that we were in the same position lying on opposite sides, facing each other like a reflection would. A reflection from a mirror that was very, very close. Seto's head fell on the same pillow as before, the same pillow as me, and lining up our faces, he became still again, watching and waiting. He wasn't sure if it had been the contact or just the roughness of the shaking that had elicited nothing, so he was hesitant to touch me as of yet, instead opting to wait at least the same amount of time as before. Whatever it was, he knew that it was only effective if prolonged for at least a minute, if not longer, so he counted the seconds, ceasing to even blink. The intensity of the distance between us, along with the feel of that air on my skin frozen from being inside him, it was stronger this time, and it was frightening in its suddenness and its severity, the surface above me rippled and shook, splashing and breaking its stability, and the cloudy darkness cleared for a moment, enough so that I could see a second's worth of Seto. He was surprisingly close to me, I noticed, and I saw the room behind him, and the shock on his features, which I wasn't able to see spread because the vision was covered once more with the darkness.

Seto had gasped aloud and then caught it in his throat and he nearly laughed out loud, he was winning again, and winning felt so good. The sharp corners of his mouth pointed upwards in razor thin triumph, he now knew the strategic chain reaction that would claim instant and infinite victory, stealing me away from my dreams, while in the same moment, giving me up to his own. He had already won this game, all he had to do was execute his final stroke, destroying the darkness and rescuing my mind, and he lost all fear in the excitement of victory, it was his, and now I was as well. He played his hand at once, it was the only solution left, and he had the victory even before he called out his final attack. What had caused my eyes to flash open momentarily was a tactic he had tried out because nothing else had worked. He leaned in to my face with his, and cast his eyes so he could still see mine, holding the distance between us motionless, which was really not more than an inch and a half. We breathed in the same air. Seto was patient, not having a problem with the situation, except that I was so close, but still asleep and couldn't agree or disagree with anything. It wouldn't be right….would it? Holding his ground, he pushed the impulse away, finding it unfitting to his purpose. He was not here to sneak around the relationship, in fact, he was hoping to tell me that, if I ever woke up. Then I had that moment of sight, which was a response to everything he had ever wanted my response from, and Seto was instantly mad with the terribly fortunate double victory, and savored the moment, before finishing me off. In one fluid moment, he gracefully closed the remaining space between his form and mine, skating across the distance until we not only met in the motion, but he found himself slightly above as well, and he waited for just a moment, knowing I couldn't stop him. Taking it all in, he lost his triumphant look and took on another, a strange one that didn't fit around his features as well as the others. It hadn't been used as much, and it felt as strange at it looked, as he felt nothing of the victory and was shocked inside, but far too busy in the moment to acknowledge. He wished that I had been awake, my look would surely reflect his, and he would recognize on my face an expression that was unfamiliar on his own. But I wouldn't come back until he came to get me, and with that final thought, he descended into the same closeness as before, waiting and watching my eyes for the second to strike. After a short while that was painfully longer to Seto, my reflex to his close proximity struck, and my eyes opened, the way was clear.

He jumped, and in my mind I saw the surface above me illuminated with the glimpse of Seto and light, and with it, almost in the same breath, the ripples that calmly spread around the separation froze, and then shattered, sending a chain of destruction in every direction, showering the darkness with the splinters. And the emptiness above was no longer calm and weightless, it forced gravity upon me. I was drawn outside of myself in a rushing motion that was a shock to my dormant mind, and I returned to my body in a blind panic. I found the familiarity immediately, and all in one second I remembered everything, and almost forgot about the way it felt in my mind right then and there. The only thing that I found to be unfamiliar was what I was doing, evidently had been doing, was still doing, regardless of familiarity or not. Coming back into the realm of touch and taste, I found my body under a physical assault that I had not been able to connect to until just that moment, when all of it came together at once in a recognizable and tangible place and time. Seto had done what I needed, he had woken me from my dreams, and done so by way of a kiss. A kiss that I had returned, been returning, and found myself completely helpless to not return still. But it broke apart, slowly he drew back for just a few centimeters, to see if I was really awake and there. Just far enough to see my open eyes, wide and full of surprise, and underneath it, the first part of a smile.

"Joey?" No one moved at all. No one wanted to. Finally, the ring of avoidance had been broken, and although it had been unavoidable, it was still appreciated by the both of us. Feeling nearly an inch of lonely space as miles that stood between my lips and his, I spoke in return, and the movement of my words caused a dangerous stirring. "You're here…will you stay here until the end…?" As I spoke, I felt a slight touch, once and then twice, signaling the accidental brushing of my mouth against his in the innocent motion of speaking, resulting in a less than innocent consequence involving both participating parties. Still, neither one of us dared to move, no one was willing to break the moment, the highly anticipated closeness that we were sharing and still thought might not be real. Seto answered after a few seconds, his eyes filled with fear and confidence, somehow able to feel both instantaneously. "I refuse to be anywhere else. Will you help me finish this?" I nodded with a slight smile. I would do anything he asked. He was glad for it, and released some of the nervousness that tensed his body, which I realized right then was on mine, directly on mine, and with the realization I blinked at him, becoming nervously tense myself. I had no further time to react, however, before the empty space was filled, neither one of us admitting to responsibility but were both to blame for it. We met in the middle once again, only this time I was awake and aware, and desperately willing. The inevitable and terrible future that was upon us would have to be patient for a moment.

AN: I couldn't do it. I'm so weak! Actually, I just wasn't aware that all this gooey crap would happen, and I realized that I had a lot of pages on my hands, so why not post this? There's not much left to happen and I knew the final events would take some time, so I did all the building in this chapter so I could just jump into the end next. And after everything goes down (when the shit hits the fan, as you might say) and it's all over, there will be a short last chapter epilogue kinda thingy, so don't run out after the next chapter, because the end will be more sad than it should be, everyone will be in the moment and whatnot, and know how emotional these boys can get….


	9. falling and landing

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

I think that I will finish Clear Vision as soon as this is all over. I've had my fling, I'll be faithful now, I think. The only thing I was thinking of doing as well was a one-shot as a side to Urgency, the first time the other appears, and what he does to Joey. That might be super-fun. But I miss Clear Vision, and the eternally tense situation that makes them act all funny-like. You could swim through the tension between those boys... Anyway, here is the second to last chapter, after this is the closing-guy, then no more. Life will cease to be urgent. Other self-destructive activity awaits these two, and who am I to stand in their way? Ahem. Singing............................one...two...onetwothreefour!

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I will never allow you to go.

I have waited so long to hear your voice, hear you say the words that I said to you with my eyes, every second of every day. And finally, now I have what I want. And I know that you are nearly lost in your mind, your heart hasn't much left to hold it together.

I heard you. You told me you loved me, in the way that I've loved you for all this time. I never asked you if you did. You never told me if you did. I knew. You knew. We did nothing.

But now, all of that is gone and lost, we have forgotten regret and cast it aside for good, choosing instead to feel what came out from within, releasing the hidden and stifled desires from inside us both. Now, in these final seconds, this rushing and burning that has gripped of every inch of my being, this is all I am allowed to feel. All I can see, taste, touch, hear, is you and you have me, all of me, and I'm screaming your name....

"Seto!!" I couldn't ever hear it escape my lips, thought and reality were meaningless and one, the same discarded burden, I knew nothing and no one but him. It was the only thing left for us to finish, the last bridge we had to cross. It just wouldn't do to search for another way to pass to the other side, this was the One Path, and we gave in and stepped forward. It was the way to many things that we desperately wanted to reach before it was too late. At the end of this road lay the resolution in our feelings, the long awaited release that had been building ever since the day of my abduction. It was the finish line of the race, the breaking of the circle, the moment where the pursuit was won and I had been caught at long last.

A successful chase had come to a close, the prey would never escape now, and was subject to the will of the captor. But Seto's will was my weakness and his opportunity, and I gave him everything he demanded of me, and more. He had moved in no sooner than I gave my consent to allow him to ask. Which was the first and foremost event that was taking place at that moment, driven into reality and given a name through the motions of the physical realm we played out, in a representation of the question. A question I had been waiting for, wondering, hoping, and completely accepting of any possible want or need of Seto's.

But even I was surprised, when I found that he had no other way to ask it of me. It had to be shown to me, what he wanted from me, and this was the only method of realizing the opportunity. So, I agreed, and he was insistent and greedy as ever, he was Seto, and he wanted something that only I could give him, it seemed. And I have never known Seto Kaiba to refrain from taking what he wanted, no matter who was the rightful owner. It didn't matter, I was taken and I would have offered it regardless of whether or not it was a necessary method of posing this question. For no reason at all, if the chance had come. I wasn't in any way casual or careless with my body. It wasn't mine to treat badly in the first place. It was his, I was merely living in it until the day he came to collect.

So it was on that day, when I was sober and in my right mind, and he had finally discovered the way of asking, that Seto and I slept together, and ended the way of the past, admitting the truth. We made it in time.

Every place that we met, the afflicted skin was pure fire, and was almost too painful to bear. The way his flesh moved against mine, it warmed and then froze it simultaneously, to a terrifying degree, I wanted to cry tears of misery and desire, wanting so much more, and in the same turn horrified that he would deliver what I foolishly requested. It was the feeling of being burned alive, all of the pieces of me were under fire, sacrificed to kindle the flame so it could stay alive and burn a bit brighter, lingering in the ashes of what had been my body. I needed to cry, to shed some of these tears, I tried and tried to release the emotion from my eyes, but I just couldn't feel the droplets on my skin, I felt something else in their place.... I opened my eyes in question, and saw nothing at first, all was masked in a thick haze that wouldn't be lifted and blocked the entire world except for one thing. Seto Kaiba, eyes wider than I had ever thought possible, and filled with a color I thought I would never see. For the blue that had been previously iced over with dusting of splintered silver was not there, and I collided with the replacement in awe. The blue had somehow been thawed and heated, and the protective layer of frost was forgotten and gone, leaving behind the darkest blue of an endless sea without hesitation.

His form was just above my own, and every motion his body inflicted upon mine was the single source of all my pain and torture, and the same one responsible for the insatiable appetite that played me to his pace, demanding for more of the same. I watched him, feeling my muscles trembling with the strain of the onslaught, unable to shut my eyes once again for fear that he might disappear, perhaps this was a dream of death, and I was leaving at last. But it wasn't so, and I knew it, for this moment was far too like a dream to be anything other than reality. His face was not directly matching my stare, he saw it but had been occupied previously, and I saw what had become of the tears I sought out. His face was pressed into the side of my own, and I saw what had been felt but not recognized, as the sight of the act met the sensation in my mind, and a shudder shook my spine violently. His lips were pressed on my cheek, near to my eyes and with his mouth open slightly, my eyes raced to follow his tongue as it denied me the privilege of liquid release. Slowly and relentlessly, he destroyed any traces of an unsolicited outpouring, and finding the end of them at last, smiled rather sickly into my cheek, which pressed his teeth into my face and threatened the delicate skin that could feel the sharp edges and points above.

I became aware, albeit distantly and after many delayed moments, of the placement of his hands that were, impressively enough, still with a minimal amount effort and never shook or trembled in the slightest under support. One of them was far, too far for me to see and therefore too far to exist completely, but I felt as though it were involved with the also-distant but consistent pressure that held my waist slightly in the air. The other hand, which made it's presence known seconds later, I found to be hopelessly tangled and twisted within the confines of the sweat dampened locks of hair that had before served as my bangs. Now, as the hair gave and began pulling at my scalp, the fist inside tightened its grip and he flicked his wrist, yanking my head aside and back so I faced the wall directly aside our bed and away from him, forcefully driven into the pillow beneath.

The motion was a calculated one. Seto, in his feverish mind, still amazingly found room to harbor a ever present motivation to be the best and greatest at everything he did, up to and including me. Recalling a previous suspicion he vaguely sensed awhile back, the suspicion had grown upon conception and had acted like a virus in his mind, developing into 'uncontrollable' dreams and 'unwanted' moments of imagined testing, where Seto might finally be afforded the chance to put his theory into practice (He swore he had no choice in the matter...). Regardless of motivation, the prediction was correct, and the dominating gesture succeeded in nearly driving me over the edge in a wild panic, and I screamed, so loud, as though I were in indescribable agony, but my body betrayed my true reaction, and Seto saw and grinned madly.

Then, in a shared moment we felt in unison, the last edge of sanity that stood before all fell into madness was in sudden view, and the common fever continued to rise as always, slowly ascending towards the total and final Breaking Point that might end us both. The severity of the intention behind the act broke through into Seto's mind, and the moment of the asking was close, very close, and he released my hair quickly, to which I turned back upwards and met with his gaze, and understood at once. The want he spoke of was just ahead, and we couldn't go back now. Unless my answer was "No", we would be resolved and realized as one, and Seto would have a clear and weightless mind, and we would never be apart again. In this room, in our bed, we would await death finally without regrets. Or at least, that was the most obvious end in sight. Neither of us had the will or the strength to save the other, and both he and I were dying at once. What else could possibly come to pass?

These thoughts flew by, and I acknowledged them and quickly threw them aside, this was not the time for sadness or thoughts of the end. This was Seto's moment, and I was more than anxious to hear him speak his mind, not even knowing enough to guess at his desire from me. Not only that, but he had been absolutely certain, without a doubt, that he could never explain what it was in words. He had to show me the way to the place he spoke of, and it had to be immediately before him when I answered. Not that it bothered me, it was just so cryptic. Still, my mind held these thoughts only for seconds, until his insistency demanded my undivided attention in the physical side of the event. He seemed as one who has nearly lost his place in the world and didn't care in the least, knowing nothing but me and this place I had inside, he knew he had almost uncovered it, it was slightly deeper still.....

Meanwhile, in the same seconds he spent in search of something, I spent under the fury and raging temper of the building pressure that was my body's response to the intrusion upon my soul. He was touching every part of me in expectation, peering into the dark places in my mind, lifting things here and there, feeling the walls of my heart for a hidden door, and curiously I watched him in his search. Wondering what it could be, and if I knew where it was. I hoped I did, I'd hand it over as soon as he spoke of it. But he really was about to speak at last, and I found my body underneath his once more as we came as close as the edge would allow, without falling into the blinding and frozen flame that waited below with infinite patience. We would be driven over soon. Our eyes were open and locked in the haze of the others, and then he spoke aloud and the familiar voice reached my ears and the words fell into my mind, slowly piecing themselves together until they formed a coherent message, because neither of us was able to speak in much more than symbols. "Joey....this is...is it......this is where it is........I......I need you to....let me........" he couldn't even blink, and neither could I, and as he continued to speak I felt everything suddenly slow down and wind to a halt, as if it was paused for a moment, and I was unable to move or speak with my body.

I felt no fear or panic, just curiosity, and I reached out to Seto who felt it in his mind, and I could hear him as well. He was much more collected this time, his words were flawless and he told me what he wanted in plain and simple language. "Joey, now, this is it. I want you and I to live. But...I know that it's too late to wish for a happy ending. I'm sorry for that. Do you forgive me?"

"I do. You forgive me, as well?" I was so close to him in this moment.

"Of course I do. Joey....do you know what will happen to me soon? When my heart finally falls apart completely?"

I wasn't aware that there had been more than that, but if he didn't really die, then.....

"I don't understand, Seto. Won't you die?" I felt him disagree, as though he had shaken his head.

"My body won't die, my heart will. My heart puzzle will fall apart, and there won't be anything to connect my body to my soul. Well, my half of our soul. But if I can't feel my body, I won't know it's there. And with my soul as well, if my body can't locate the soul within, it will fall asleep. And it won't wake up. I'll be stuck inside with no way out, until my body dies naturally. My body's only seventeen, Joey. That could be for a lot longer than you plan on being there."

My sadness heard it all, and I was overcome. There was nothing I could do for him. And I wanted to cry, but he continued and shook the tears from my mind.

"There's something that you can do. It's not a happy ending in any way, but you'll have saved me from a fate as horrible as that. Would you still, maybe, consider saving me after all....even if I can't save you in return?"

I was as confused as ever, but his words were promising enough to raise my spirits.

"Seto, I would do anything you asked me to. And I would save you even if you didn't ask at all. I don't understand what you want me to do...." What the hell had he been searching for? What did I have inside that he knew about, and I evidently didn't?

"You know where it is. We're almost there. It's the place inside that you hold that ridiculous hope in, waiting for me. Where you slept inside, while I was gone. You keep it empty, except for the flame...remember?" I did. I remembered the dream I was lost in, the things I said while I was inside were now all coming back, one by one, and they all pointed to the place, which was just within reach, the destination of the climax that stood before us, and they echoed silently.

_I hope that he wants to ask me for what I so deeply desire to give him._

_I hope he knows the depths of what I hold inside, a place for him that waits eternally_

_Until that very moment, I would be feeding the place inside that waited for him, filling it with the hope that he had asked me to hold strong. The closest place in the world, reserved for him alone and the many faceted flames that I held inside, reflecting my whirlwind of feelings that were ever present and constantly burning. They were equal in purity and intensity, existing only to be given up when he came to exchange them with his own, if ever it was to happen. _

The only way to open the door, which was why it had never been opened, was the complete and full surrender of everything I had, offered up to the person I invited inside. But exchanging....he couldn't take mine in return. Would it work like that?

"If you have nowhere to take my half, then....will it still work?"

Seto was silent. I still couldn't see a thing, but could feel every flickering emotion and thought that went through his mind, he knew the answer....

"It will....work. It might be dangerous for someone to bear the full weight of an entire soul. But you won't die, and I'll die soon afterwards, physically. But it will be better this way. I won't let you walk away from me, I absolutely refuse. Even if I have to possess half of you in the process. And I most certainly won't be left to rot in some eternally sleeping and useless body, wandering aimlessly without a goddamned clue. Absolutely not!"

He was so bossy. He'd threaten the gun held to his own head, just to insult the audacity of it's lethal nature, and how foolish it was to allow itself to be pointed at a head as ingeniously superior as his own. He felt my amusement and became neutral, silent and thoughtful once more. I took the opportunity and spoke.

"You know very well that I would never let anything like that happen to you. I wasn't fully aware of the situation. Seto, I just....as soon as you leave your body, you'll be gone for good, won't you? So then, if that's true, then....this is the last time we'll ever speak to each other....the final end?" I lost myself in the moment, realizing the truth. I would save him from one end, and instead cast him into another. A dormant state of dreaming, drifting slowly back and forth but never fully waking or sleeping. A place I had gotten quite enough of within 78 hours, would be his lifetime? But I understood that it was infinitely better. He would be dreaming inside me, not lost and alone, and I smiled at the newfound hope that was conceived at that moment, from the two of us. Now that there was a two of us to combine as one.

I was in a state of pureshock, but I would do it, of course. I had never considered another option. I just didn't want to be the one who personally swung the axe. This place we spoke inside of wasn't my body, so I couldn't even feel like I wanted to cry, instead I felt the darkening of my heart, and it began to grow heavy with the terrible pain, the awful choice, to either lose Seto and let him suffer, or take Seto away myself, and drown his soul into mine, carrying the full weight of our two entities. The pain in my fate hadn't even felt like a consideration. I was sad inside at the task before me, and the way I would have to execute it. As we came to our first climax, together and finally the same person after all that hesitation, and the only moment of perfection I had to carry in memory of us. I wouldn't even want to remember it at all this way, and it became heavier still. He felt the weight on my heart and was silent in a side stepping sort of way, he had done this, and could not stop.

"Joey......I....this is the only way possible to save us both. You'll see what I mean, when it's all over. Please don't be sad. This will be all right. You'll be with me forever. You and me, until the day you die, and I'll be right here......even if it's not the same, you won't forget me, cause you won't be away. I just won't be another person, separate from you."

I knew all that. Here where everything was easy to see, and ideas were formed without effort, I saw the appeal to Seto, and I saw that it really was the one way out of the demise Fate had decided for him, which I imagine pissed him off to no end, not to mention was a really terrifying thing to suffer from, awaiting death for a release from knowing nothing, only that you used to know and you don't anymore. I wouldn't let that happen to anyone, especially someone I loved as much as Seto. But why did it have to be by my hand.....? I made my choice. I would save Seto. And most likely destroy myself in the process. If I got out of this alive, I would be a broken person, indeed. I couldn't handle this...living my life while holding him inside like a trapped spirit, condemning him to watch and listen and be silent and feel no one, waiting for me to die? It wasn't all that much better than before, but I knew that it really was, deep down.

"Come on, Seto....let's end this. Whatever happens....I still love you. I hope that we'll make it through this. And I hope for better things.....if we ever have a second chance at this...."

He was ready, as much as he'd ever be. "Thank you.... for saying yes....and, well...." he sounded strange, as if he were skirting the issue, and I shut him up before he made himself sick.

"I know. Come on."

The moment we both let go, we were set into motion as if we hadn't stopped, and we immediately remembered the arm's length before the jump, we found the way back into each others eyes, and we smiled simultaneously. It was a happy ending, at least in the smile that was shared between us. It was the happiest moment of my life. I still believe that, even now. And that was enough, I decided, and resolved to save Seto and to stop being so greedy. I had plenty of memories that still belonged to me. They were real and they happened, and I had never even dared to dream of them a year ago. I had more than I had hoped to ever have. And I would keep all there was to myself. Whatever was left of Seto belonged to me.

The feelings and emotions rushed all around us as they returned, and all at once I felt the blinding flame of ecstasy as we both tumbled over the edge, falling into the insanity of pure feeling. And I did find the door, it was simple and clear, and I opened it with little effort. And in the release we shared, he took the place that waited inside. He went quietly, but it changed nothing. The most terrible and inescapable anguish was of the mind and soul, and both of mine were screaming in agony at the intrusion, I screamed as well, so loudly, but I couldn't stop. I couldn't even hear it, my own voice raised in horror. I felt as though I would fall apart at the very seams. There wasn't a space left inside me and I was full to the brim, and another single drop would kill me instantly. I had no idea what my body was doing in response, but my mind and soul were crying out, for so long I couldn't breathe or see, or feel, I was just pain itself. But it wouldn't last forever. It faded with the time that passed slowly, and I could see the way to the physical realm, the place I belonged.

After it began to slowly subside, I lay where I was until I could face the real world, and the real pain inside the truth that lay there. I felt the sudden pangs of emptiness within, and panicked, until I realized what it was. Rejection. There wasn't anyone to open any doors for me in return, and I thought maybe Seto was already gone. I knew I felt him inside me already, but still.....maybe. Just another moment with him....

I slammed the door shut within. The echo sang once or twice in the hollows of my mind, but they only sealed the door even further, despite the sad protest they sounded. It was over. I opened my eyes.

It was almost exactly as I had left it. I wore absolutely nothing,just like him, lying on the bed in the room we shared. He was still above me, but he made no further efforts to hold himself up, or to move at all. His arms fell around me, one over each of my sides in an embrace that felt nothing at all. His head rested on my chest, just below my collarbone, and I peered around his dark hair, lifting his chin at the same time, until my eyes met his. They were unmistakablyempty. Devoid of any spark whatsoever, filledonly with the ice that froze from within and spreadslowly outwards, to claimthe far reaches of his lifelessbody. His touchwas replaced with that of the Dead of Winter. Seto was not inside.He was gone.

And I finally got to cry, at long last. I raised both of my arms up around him and held him as close as I could to me, as if I could still comfort him this way. As if he weren't sinking deeper within me at that moment. Never needing comfort again, never feeling this embracewith me again. I only held tighter, and the tears came for so long, but I couldn't make them end. I never wanted to make anything end, ever again.I refused to bring that Winter to my own hands.Seto would be the last. I wouldn't ever kill myself now. He won. That bastard....he found a way to save me. It was unreal, that boy....Seto Kaiba always won. No matter what.

"I'm sorry, Seto...but please, don't cry.....I can't stand it when you cry.......it makes me cry too....."

"I know you're not...........butI am. There's nowhere for me to fall.........."

"Don't make me cry on my own................"


	10. and landing alone

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

This is the finale-thingy. Joey sorts out his feelings, and knows now what he wished he had known long ago. Well, ain't that the saddest damn sob story you ever heard? I think I'll have to pull out my violin and play it all out in a saddeningly sad tune. This is the ending, and I'm actually very sad. Although I finished it, so I win. I liked this story, wasn't it a trip and a half? Hopefully these boys learned their lesson, they'll never deny their feeling ever again! That should help out all the writers on ! Merry Christmas! I bring tidings of submissive boys! And now I retreat to the loving arms of Clear Vision, good-bye all! Bye, Seto, hope you get a new body soon! Bye Joey, don't stay in that sock drawer of Seto's for too long! You'll never find him in there!

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Here is the Beginning. It is not the beginning of the End, and it is not the End of a single thing.

This is the Beginning.

Born from the end of far too much. More than I was willing to give. But it does not matter.

The Beginning will not be stopped. My will, the will of He that I lost, the will of the one I am now.

I am taken with the Beginning and I am someone new. I am both He and I, the lost two from before.

They were human and were cursed from the first moment they became aware of one another's life.

Their selfish and empty lives would destroy one another in time. It was inevitable. Fate.

They hated Fate. Especially Him. He sought to defy Fate, and eventually succeeded. It cost Him all that He had, but He wouldn't run away from Me.

And I was the force that drove Him. The power that fueled Him. The love that consumed Him.

I lifted Him up to Fate, so Fate could see Him as He defied It. To It's face.

He did not serve anyone but Himself, and I was His other half, His other Soul.

I can see this, because I am All of Them Both. I am the Soul that they were Together.

I carry It inside me, It is safe within me. I love both He and I.

But Joey is the one you know the best. Joey can still speak as one alone.

Joey can join Seto as The One Soul, or Joey can come apart, alone and simply be Joey again.

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As Joey, it will be easier to talk about these memories. I can stay as just Joey whenever I want to, but the new part about me and what was left of Seto sharing a body is that I can become the half of him and me that is the whole soul joined with him, since his soul is all I have left of him. Just his pure energy, the balance to my own, only without all the things that made it Seto's own feeling. Now, it's just a feeling that he was based on, and was for a time.

He'll come back someday after I die, and he'll be similar, based on the same energy, but until I die as well, I'm afraid it's all I've got of the one I loved more than life itself. And still love in the same way, even though that person, Seto Kaiba, doesn't exist anymore, and never will again. There is only ever one heart puzzle that a person can have. The pieces, they fit together in a certain way that holds all your personality traits, your feelings and emotions, your favorite things, the things that create You. Once the heart puzzle dies, so does the part of the person that was shaped around the puzzle, and all that's left is the life that can never die. The same life that will, in time, receive another heart puzzle, and begin anew. And I am certain that we will know the things we did not know before.

I miss Seto. I loved him so much, and it hurts to say those words, but I cannot lie. I love him still.

I always will. He was my other Half. And I have no other Half anymore. No one could come close.

I cry for long and empty nights. I still live in his house. I stay in his room. I sleep in his bed.

I know he called them 'ours' but I would rather call them his. His things are precious like nothing else can touch.

His company belongs to me. I have no authority whatsoever. I am not involved in any way. Everything is run by appointed and official people, places, and things. I don't understand it very well, or how it all works. But it's all in my name. Kaiba Corp., owned by Joey Wheeler. Imagine that. Or better yet, imagine the rest of the people who knew he and I, and the moment they heard the news. All of his things are mine now. And in that way, he is still here.

Here with me. I would burn it all, everything he ever owned, if it would give him back to me. But he cannot go back or forth any longer. He isn't a real person. But he saved my life.

He said he would from the start. That was the reason behind everything that led to the Today I see here and now. He was stubborn, and insistent, and he demanded that he would save me from the very day he took me from the rest of the world. There is nothing to be done in the force of a will that powerful. He knew that I would never hurt him in any way. And he saw his chance to save me from myself. I would never, ever in my life allow Seto to take my drugs, or any other for that matter. And I would never cut him or treat his body carelessly, I wouldn't starve him, or make him sad for no reason. But I would do all these things to myself. So, his first step was to somehow make me treat myself the way I treated Seto. And his plan would work flawlessly.

I haven't done a single line since that day. I've taken care of Seto inside me as I would take care of Seto anywhere. I've showered care and concern upon him, through my body that was unsure of what to do with its newfound state of health. I still love him this much. I keep him close, closer than anything is and could ever be, in a secret place that is only his. I keep him there, and with him are my memories of him, and the ten months we had together.

Through me, Seto Kaiba is still a real person. He will continue to survive because I remember him. I remember the way he was, how could I not? I am nearly in fear of the countless masses that unfortunately will never be able to erase his memory from their lives. They never saw him at all, I am the only person who knew him and remembered him fondly. The images in my mind are real, and they are images of events that happened here in reality, and Seto Kaiba is one of them, he was a real person, he lived with me. This is the other reason why I can no longer cause myself suffering. I am Seto Kaiba. I am the last piece left. In my memory is his last hideout, his last waiting place before the final comeback, and it seems that he's got us all fooled, once again. He'll walk out one of these days, tired of waiting and irritated with the foolish indecisiveness of Death, and upon the first vision we catch of him, here amongst the living once more, he'll roll his eyes at our amazement because we had dared to lose hope so soon. We would no doubt be struck with awe, The Great Seto Kaiba, the miracle that just won't quit. And then he'll make a sound at us, disgusted with our reactions, and at the same time dismissing our existence rudely. He'll turn on his heel and stalk away as such a truly important person should, and he'll begin formulating a new and even more expensive and elaborate plan to host the next great tournament of Duel Monsters, with which he will finally be able reclaim his title as the Greatest Duelist That Would Ever Be. And then, almost as if on call for this sort of thing, Fate would seize the opportunity so carefully constructed to fit Seto's own selfish purposes, and steal it away from him in the name of Destiny. Seto would be stripped of all credit and originality for the organization and would forego the honor to whomever it was that they claimed he must be, some idiot of a Sorcerer who's tale was undoubtedly reiterated from that infuriatingly ridiculous fairy tale, and all the while ruining his plans and robbing him of his nearly won title, always waiting until he was within reach and then shattering the prospect entirely. And in the end, forced to do what he would have done all along in the first place, and somehow inevitably acquiring the shining title of Everyone's Friend by no fault of his own, having to shake himself free of the all the little clambering idiots for what he thought was the last time, or at least prayed it was. All just to be able to calmly level the whole damn thing in a desperate attempt to free himself from the stifling jaws of the iron-clad amusement of Fate.

And everything would be like it was, as it used to be, in the time that he was here with me. Laughing at all his miserable misfortunes and failures was easier with him inside me. I knew the truth, that he would never return. So I gave up knowing the truth, and placed all my efforts into believing in Him, rather than truth. He was much more honest than Truth had ever been, anyway. My faith in him was unshakable and founded in the reality of the person I knew was real, much more tangible a belief than any religion or pure concept could ever be. I knew without a doubt, he still existed, I felt him every moment of every day. It was a terribly heavy burden, I felt a constant state of loss and loneliness, never able to have peace of mind from his memory or feeling. I never slept well without him next to me. The sheets were so cold, and I would always have to warm them all by myself. And his bed was huge, I could sprawl out in any way I wished and wouldn't even feel him on his own side, when he had been here with me. Now I could do whatever I wished, without fear of bothering him or distracting him. I wished that I could. I wished that I could really irritate him, one last time, just to see his eyes filled with that rage that I had always coaxed out of him so long ago. Sometimes I sit back and think of ways to piss him off, things that I had never dared to do for fear that he might have killed me, actually murdered me. I always laughed at the image of his snarling and enraged temper so easily felt all around him. I wonder when I'll have the chance to try one of these ideas out on the real thing.

I wait here patiently. I have nothing else to do, no obligation to anyone for the rest of my life. I don't go to school anymore, or hang out with other people who sometimes stop by. They don't ask me to come outside, they understand that I can't leave him. All of my memories of him and I were here in his house. We spent all our time together here, and to this day I have never been able to set one foot outside. I don't think about if I ever will. Time will prove that fact on it's own. I am satisfied to live out my life here together with the way we were. If I am silent, I can still hear him yelling at me in anger, whenever I remember doing something to piss him off in vivid detail. I can sit in our room and think of a question that I asked him, and after a few seconds without thought or sound, I will hear his response, just as it was when it left his lips. He is still here with me, and it's more than enough to keep me alive for as long as I can stay here, in this house. Following my thoughts and memories, chasing endlessly after the remotest and faintest traces of Seto Kaiba that remain here, lingering in the presence of he and I, and settling into the very foundations of the home itself. This is a feeling I can live for. I'm no longer in love. I am in love with the memory of our love. It is the best feeling in the world, and I hold it close to our heart.

AN: Well, it's not the joyous reunion that some may have wanted (maybe even me), but it's not as sad as it sounded like it was going to be. For a while I thought that it would all end in tragedy, and maybe the world would blow up, or something.....but here you are, then. This feel like closure, it's often missing in angsty stories so I made sure to smooth out some of the rougher edges of the last full chapter. Hopefully this helps with the cryptic and ever elusive plot, I guess some things are left unsaid for the better, as not to embarrass Seto. He's sensitive, that little sissy boy...


	11. A Sense of Urgency oneshot

A Sense of Urgency

A Seto/Joey one-shot by subaruxkamui4ever

AN: Well, I just couldn't keep away. I found this on my laptop, and decided to finish the ending and then just post it as a oneshot, it does not, I repeat, DOES NOT continue from the epilogue. This takes place about a month after Joey is kidnapped by Seto, and it includes both Seto asking Joey to move in to his own room, and then Joey's first experience with Seto's darker self, you remember him…right? He's crazy, I tell ya what. This is just something I wanted to touch on since it seems a bit unclear in the story. Joey talks about it briefly but I guess it seems vague, or something. Well, if you really liked The Urgency of Life, then Happy Birthday! Or Valentine's Day, or whatever….

falling…….

falling and it is so unreal……how you and I have lived like we have……

A month…..and you aren't who you were…..or perhaps I'm someone new…..

It doesn't matter. You gave me a place to stay that I wanted to return to at the end of the day, and anything I could want to have….I'm sorry that I never asked you for what I truly wanted, but I was too afraid……we were so close, and I wanted you to stay here, with me….

And then, after a month of passing the lazy time away doing absolutely nothing but what we wanted to, I still stayed the nights in the room you gave me, it was next to yours and you watched me closely from there if you felt something amiss, and things were the same until this one day. For some reason, even though this is all over, I still think of this day so often….I think of you constantly with every waking moment, but this day is caught in my memory as of recent times that I still spend here idly, wasting the years away until we can be free.

It changed us so much, it was such a short time yet after it was spent, we were new and unfamiliar to one another, and it was the best feeling, to have more of you to discover, and more of me to show you, to let you see me even closer than before. As close as your room would allow, and your bed was ours now. You asked me, and I smiled, so real and full, so sobering and cleansing, I felt like for one still and stolen second, I wasn't being eaten away by addiction, and you weren't forcing yourself to watch. It's a nice memory…..

"Joey…hey. How much longer before you can come out of there?" Seto asked from just behind the bathroom door that was one of the two doors that divided our rooms, and I cracked a grin at his attempts to mask impatience with concern. Of course he felt both, but he knew that I would only find it upsetting if he showed actual signs that he was beginning to suffer from the loss of control he felt at my terrible and life threatening habit. I just couldn't quit, not just yet. There wasn't really any reason to quit, if it had really come down to considering what would be gained, which wasn't a whole lot. Regardless of the amazing distance that we had closed between us in the mere month that left our sight since my kidnapping, I still fully believed that I would never have what I wanted, what I wanted for him to want. I was so tired from Love, it drained the life out of me, and with no one to return my love it just left me and was not returned, and I was left doubly empty. I tried to fill myself up with drugs and Seto's friendship, but neither one was the real need and want, and therefore neither would be the cure. So instead of confronting the endlessness and inevitable end that I was drawing to the both of us, it was clouded and hidden in my drugged and lonely state.

And through all of it, Seto had been so very patient and cooperative with my demands and unhealthy lifestyle. I was astounded, to say the least. After the time I spent just looking at him from farther outfield, trying to instigate fights and duels, running after him whenever he tried to leave without acknowledging my presence and always ending up humiliated…. He was never that person in this place, with just me around. No one and nothing he needed to control was pressuring him, and I saw how I had been pushing him into a corner in front of the eyes of others, a corner that he feared and despised, forced to act out against me because I was simply relentless. But those days were gone, we were bridging that awful emptiness that I had pushed in between us, believing falsely that in the absence of Love, Hate would have to do. It was much better than nothing, feeling indifference for me would have driven my mind off the edge so long ago. But the edge was unnecessary, and I was overreacting, as usual.

But unbeknownst to me at that moment, Seto had another living inside him, parasitic and insatiable it was but still so necessary for his remaining scraps of sanity. The person he had to be when in direct contact with a threat or a challenge, or a situation and time that he needed to conquer, that person was not Seto. This person had been the same one that took Kaiba Corp. and saved Seto long ago, so many times when he was just a small and confused child, and grew to understand the world in rapidly worsening conditions. All around him, things did nothing but fall apart, indefinitely and to the worst extent possible. Not one, but both parents lost, one at a time and far apart so that mourning for one was nearly finished and at rest, and then just when he felt he might be able to stand up, he was knocked right back down, and this time for good. There was no one left to care for him now, and no one to lend a hand to lift him up once more. So he stayed down indefinitely, truly defeated. But not before sending someone in his place, someone that was stronger then a small and shattered boy could ever hope to be. Someone who looked just like Seto because he used Seto's body, and while Seto laid within himself and tried to heal from the second blow, the other Seto took care of things topside.

This person that Seto invited inside at a last and desperate grasp at the remaining shards of his life, was not a person at all, but the shadows around him. Neither positive nor negative, shadows by nature are the results of a nearby light, and are necessary for life to be driven unending. Without the shadows, light would not begin and it would not end, and there could never be a balance, instead just a blinding and oppressively infinite light that would only destroy what it tried to create. It would be futile and imperfect because it would be timeless perfection. The shadows are what you make of them, they lie in wait and offer their darkness to the fallen and nearly lost, the ones who need to rest in the night and wait for the light to return to them. Seto took himself into the shadows and their cover, and he filled the broken heart he had with the shadows trying replace the missing puzzle pieces that were taken along with his family. Unfortunately, shadows cannot fill places, only make them hidden, and Seto's heart became hidden from the light, and instead of healing he grew to need the shadows. What was intentionally supposed to be a place to rest and heal before returning to light was not quite understood by a Seto so very young that he should not have had to do either one. Life does not favor by age, however, and Seto did not release his heart from the shadows. For what?, he thought, there was no purpose, they had taken care of him, he was so successful and together when it all happened, the end result being the confident and Master Seto in charge. He had allowed the darkness to show him the power and fulfilling nature of dominance and it was something that filled his heart, if only temporarily. He sought it out madly, in every confrontation, asserting himself and nearly overly so, intending to crush all as opposed to merely defeat the one. Why just win when you can have it all, the title and the power relevant in the pursuit? Why then, after sharing everything with the comforting and supporting darkness within, why was it suddenly just ripped from his hands without warning, shocking and polluting his weak and fragile heart with a blinding light that managed to not only cleanse him of his established way of life, but very literally and life threateningly broke his entire heart puzzle, every piece was scattered and lost in the dark recesses of his soul. What could possess a person to do this, no one even knew Seto well enough to make a judgment upon him such as this, and upon only two aggressive encounters this uninvited shadow of a person had sealed Seto's fate as though he thought that he was Fate itself. It was that dead and lingering ruler of Men from long ago, still disruptively marching onward in his never ending pursuit of getting his righteous way, and finishing his all-important tasks and carelessly handled affairs here amongst the living, no matter who dared to get in his way. It was so hypocritical of a dark soul such as he, filled with shadows himself and yet his purpose here was always deemed worthy by the Fate that so often was the demise of Seto himself. He was merely a tool, someone who had all the opportunities that the Pharaoh needed, and Seto was only being selfish and 'not a good friend' just because he wouldn't fall on his knees and give everything he had to help the self-important spirit that had ruined the remainder of his life. Forced Seto to rebuild a heart puzzle without enough pieces with which to do so, and then taunting him for the seemingly pitiful results, which were still admirable, it was so very admirable that he was still sane. But it left emotional places empty, and this is where the other comes to life and into the real world.

Inside Seto the unfulfilled urge to control his life was still very much alive, since this was the way he had trained his heart to function. Fill it with the dominance, the power of control, the satisfaction of unwilling submission before him, fill it if only for just hours, and his heart still cried out for more. But with no shadow to execute the necessary actions, he found himself to be just Seto, the broken boy who missed his parents and waited for them to return, still the same miserable and shattered child from all those years of hiding in the dark. And now the child was the CEO of the largest gaming company in the entire world, and had millions of dollars, millions of employees, and even millions more enemies. No amount of vacationing or searching for himself in a quiet cottage would ever do any good. His soul needed an answer, and yesterday was far too late. He simply caved into the need, losing control when it was overwhelming, thinking initially that he had been just falling to the floor and losing consciousness, since he was alone the first few times his mind blanked out and he realized that he had been gone for awhile. Always for seconds, perhaps minutes, and sometimes extending to a quarter of an hour, never remembering a thing, but feeling much more alive afterwards. As if it was a twelve hour nap he awoke from, and not a momentary lapse of reality. And then, the next time he dueled with that dead Egyptian sprit that haunted the small boy from Seto's school, he found that it had happened again, but upon returning to the waking moment and the events surrounding he found that he had continued his duel in his own absence. Seto had not lost his strategic plan for victory and had actually already executed it, it was finished, and he was in the lead. Everyone was staring at him, though, and he felt slightly shorter of breath but dismissed it, since nothing bad had come of it. Accepting it, and ignoring it, finding it unstoppable and refreshing, he let it be like the shadows before it, and went on. It didn't matter what anyone thought of him anyway. Or so had been the case, until he kidnapped me, and took me to live with him.

He found me, in his own opinion, to be stuck in a unsavory situation, a lonely and attention starved boy who was lining the cracks of his unsealed heart with Speed and unrequited Love, two destructive addictions that were, if nothing else, a quickly effective end to an unfortunate existence. Perhaps he was only curious in the things that might drive someone so happy as I seemed, to such a depressing and unhappy lifestyle. He moved me into his house the very day he found out, and ever since that moment I've lived in this room that connects to his, a bathroom in between that we share, and is left open, he watches me all the time. But today, I had shut the door, because he had been watching perhaps too much. Having someone watch you as you tear your body apart slowly with drug abuse is uncomfortable, and while he gave me any sort of support I asked for, the constant gaze I was under was feeling heavier by the day. Today I began to feel the pressure on my lungs as I tried to breath through my mouth, my nose was filled to the brain with a foul smelling chemical, burning and rotting the inside of my head in a rush of excitement and capability. He could hear me where he stood just a few feet away, and he didn't speak for awhile. He didn't want to make me talk while I was so very preoccupied, and he knew by now how long before I would be far more than just willing to speak with him. I would most likely tell him my life's story, all over again for the 'last time, I swear!,' or whatever else I had to say that would take longer than an hour to tell in full. I couldn't help it at all, I was drugged and he knew it. Seto never made me stop, he never told me to go away or to act normal. He never judged the strange things I did or said, and he never used them against me later or laughed at the way I had been. It wasn't a joking matter to him. When Seto had first brought me here, he told me of his intentions right away. He meant to break me of this habit….somehow. But this reason that I hold this day, and the few that followed, so vividly in my memory is not because of my addiction. It is because of Seto's. His hearts uncontrollable lust for power was the unbreakable habit that shook the boundaries of my mental image of Seto, and I came to understand him more, and in the process, I found I loved him deeper still.

Perhaps this one day neither of us fell. This day stood up and pushed onto the next, which fell in turn on the next, until the last day of that week fell into the darkness, and showed me the depths of Seto and his emptiness inside. At least for a pooling of moments in silence….

I heard knocking on the same door, nearly ten minutes after the first time that Seto had announced himself.

"How about now? I know that you're done at least for the moment….can I come in?" I nodded my head in a daze, a slightly hazy moment that only lasts for a minute or so. Then, after hearing him huff in annoyance at being ignored (indeed, how dare I?), I noticed that my nodding had not been heard. Stuttering in awareness, I called him in. "Wh-a….w…..what, huh? Oh, yeah…..open it." I waved my hand over dramatically at the door itself, which opened far too slowly for my liking. Peeking around the door, he saw at once my motioning and swung it open the rest of the way, entering with the stature and air of a person who was in moments going to attempt the unforgivable and succeed, or die trying. A solemn and silent gaze rested calmly across his features and the inexplicable posture that he held his frame in was less confrontational today. Instead his stance was reminiscent of an empty and open question, a compelling but not at all demanding placement of shoulders and hips that reflected an honest need for an honest answer. And in the state of mind I fell into when influenced such as I now was, it would be impossible for me to not be completely honest. He had not planned this and wasn't taking advantage of my induced state of mind, I was always like this, and he would be very hard pressed to find a less intoxicated moment alone with me, if it existed anymore. He stood very close and was not much further than two or three feet, but seemed much farther because I still sat at the table in my room, while he stood before me. It was evident in his presence itself that something was to happen and he was just going to work his way to it from here. He could hide most anything in manner of feelings and unexposed fears, but when he wanted something there was no place for it to hide on him, and he wanted something from me. Not very well able to ask me outright since he was, after all, Seto Kaiba, but since we had been staying so close for what seemed like forever, I knew that he wouldn't want anything but an answer from me, in regards to whatever it was that he had been stricken with a desperate need to know.

"How do you feel today…?" Seto asked as nonchalant as anyone could ever make their voice sound, but in a very intense and unyielding way, he seemed to draw the answers from my eyes before I could ever think of the answer on my own. To which I, having watched him the entire time and saw him trying to stay undetected, immediately turned my head to the floor and giggled out loud, for just a moment and then turned to look back up at him with a sheepishly knowing grin. He waited without breaking face at all, and was motionless in pursuit of my response. I then felt sort of sorry for laughing at him, but sometimes he was far too…much of a character to live within the confines of everyday life. The way he stood, the things he said and the words he used to express them, the overdramatic gestures that accompanied every forcefully spoken sentence…He was engrossed with his own agenda and purposes to a fault, and it was sometimes funny to see such a intense and attention grabbing persona try to be casual while retaining the same crazed look about him. He wasn't a very convincingly relaxed person, but he tried to be anyway for my sake, because if he had come at me with all the force and drive of the way he felt about asking me, I would most likely have ran off in terror. I looked down a moment so I could think without his gaze pressuring my answer, and I felt great, of course, never better in fact. "I feel just fine, thank you." I replied with an ending that left no room for doubt, he would take it as finished and continue. His mouth left it's station for a second and turned upwards at the very edges in a slight grin, and then he left to deadly serious silence afterwards. I was watching as he stayed where he was and appeared confident as the constant running of phrases and possibilities ran through his mind and under his eyes I could see them, after spending much of my time with him there wasn't so much to learn about him, and I stayed silent for the moment, watching. He resolved himself in silence suddenly and decided to be out and done with it, laying it at my feet and moving backwards mentally, for me to consider in patient thought.

"Well, I came to ask you about this room, and if it still suits you. It is much farther than I had originally thought from my own, and while I know that you would still come in here and use this room a lot for other things, I thought that since you and I, well, we've been spending time in the same rooms most of the time, anyway…..I was thinking that we might as well have this, this…..to save time, we should just…." I blinked at him and just looked blankly towards him for a second. Who was this boy? This was not at all someone I knew, and it most definitely wasn't who I lived with then, at least, it sure didn't seem like him. This boy was nervous, and somewhat losing his nerve in the moment. That never was allowed by my Seto, Seto Kaiba that I knew, and had beforehand been slightly in fear of, deep down. The idea of his moment as this nervously rambling type was ridiculous, and if I mentioned it later I'm sure he would have been very displeased with himself, something I wanted to avoid at all costs, so I never did mention it. But I sure did think about it when he wasn't around, and even now I can laugh at loud at things, moments in time such as this, which really happened and were particular to Seto and I, alone. But here he was, at that time together, and the sentence in question was still unfinished, trailing off in a path that led to unexpressed feelings and inescapable truths that had brought him in here this way. Never confessing them, of course, but they were behind his actions, which were slowly becoming less foggy, but the clear intent of Seto was still invisible as of yet. I spoke to save him from his own broken sentence, and I smiled happily at him seeing the intentions behind it, whatever they were, they were meant for me to take and keep to myself if I wished. I did take them from him and he became silent in detecting my response to his attempts at showing a feeling out loud, waiting for me to return or deny the strained efforts. "No, this room is great, I don't want to cause you more trouble for just my sake." Speaking so that he wouldn't have to, I took the moment to feel around the emotions that I picked up from him seconds ago, and it seemed that he wanted me to see that he was worried about me, very much so, and I could feel the intensity of the fears that were a constant weight for him to bear.

Seto's feelings acted the way I had imagined that emotions spawned by Seto Kaiba might feel, and they played the part accordingly, hesitantly and slowly inching forward into ambiguous affection, but sidestepping in the shadows surrounding larger patches of sunny emotions, and instead hiding in the elusive nature of obsession and stalking. However it was in his mind, it was more attractive to me this way than if he had abandoned his true nature in the efforts and become someone else, a happy and light person I did not love or know. The obsessive darkness was far better suited to him in the first place, and he wore it quite well, his chaotic and randomly striking nature was the ultimate carrier for such intense and romantically misplaced affections that were, in contrast to affection, very aggressive and dominating. Thinking of him in a slightly maniacal and calculatingly sinister fashion was the way Seto Kaiba was meant to be thought of, and by far the most influential visualization that I had kept secretly inside and never let out of my sight. Especially when he reflected this less controlled and more intimidating persona on the outside and in full exposure to all, delighting in the attention that was an automatic inevitability in his case. However, the extent to which it was laced into his heart and his emotional expression was dangerous to both he and I, and I had not seen that it had been this deeply inflicting. I found out, after this day and later in that week, that he was far more afflicted with this raging desire for control than I thought possible, extending into his platonic and, unbeknownst to both Seto and I, his romantic relationships and was his unfortunate but his natural and subconsciously most effective means of expressing himself.

After smiling at him to take his mind off the moment as he fumbled with his voice, I found myself smiling once more after the shared moment had ended. It was another similar happy grin, but in a deeper and more thoughtful way that a smile of Randomly Occurring Happiness would be, as opposed to a simple happy smile, and after I felt it inside me I knew it was the same feeling of light and connection he felt, in unison we felt it alone, together. We had felt each other on some other level, it struck us both in the same second, but we said nothing. He saw both of the smiles, and felt my exact match for his feelings at the same time as I had, and was satisfied thus far. He really had a whole lot of nothing to go on, and decided to just let himself do whatever, taking his hints from me and my responses. Never before had he allowed himself this much vulnerability and openness to failure as in these seconds with me, but he thought that he might be winning so far, and he'd certainly had enough of that addictive experience to know success when he saw it, and he did see it, plain in my eyes. In a way, this underlying and non-verbalized way of connecting to each other was far better suited to our particular purposes, especially when considering how strange and uniquely our comfortable level of relations had evolved. Not at all were either of us the sort to declare Love out loud, noisily and unappreciatively, and showing off to the passers-by. We had no standards or guidelines set to bar us from anything we may want in the future, and we each trusted the other to do what they wished to do, and right then, he wished to ask me if I would accept an offer from him. He slightly lowered his line of sight until it no longer saw me from down through his nose, but in a less haughty and more equalizing manner, which was nicely executed on his part, and I felt nearly pride at his newfound acceptance of me and my place with him in his house. And even though when he spoke his tone was a little quiet and unfriendly, it was more reassuring that way, for if it had been anything else it might not have been Seto.

Evidently, Seto was one for the final plunge, rather than the timid tiptoe around…

"Joey, do you want to stay here with me forever… move in for good, and share my room with me?"

A silence that rang all around us was not uncomfortable, just shocking in the first few moments as the sound of the words came together slowly in my mind, and formed the phrase I had just heard aloud. He felt the silence approach, and finding it to be probably a negative reaction, he tried filling it with explanatory reasoning and losing the slightly insane expression to a more pensive one, concerned. "It's much more practical this way, if you consider all the options. We'll save time…and sleep, since you stay up all hours anyway to follow me around, now you can just follow me to bed, and perhaps even fall asleep in it once in awhile. You don't have to say anything now, because I have to say something else before you agree…that is, if you are going to agree. See….I have this thing…..uh-"

I stood up in the pending doom of another of Seto's failed attempts to explain away the fact that he was becoming rather obvious as to his underlying thoughts and feelings in his asking, and he was losing more of the inhibitions that had kept him away from this place initially as well. I put my index finger to his mouth and the softly pressing placement was enough to stop his sentence for the moment. Maybe there was something in him that was like what I had inside me, for him. I knew that he liked to have me around, he wanted me to share a room with him, but I was far too close to the desires of my best kept and most wished for fantasies, and I wouldn't do anything that might jeopardize the very fragile and extremely breakable nature of our slowly developing relationship. As I was lifting the finger away, he remained silent and waited for the response to his request, patiently and in the same moment almost with a visible burning that lit him from within. I soundlessly waited and watched this Seto, who was capable of being silenced in such a submissive manner, by someone so insignificant and unmoving as I.

Defying the obvious attempt to torture my unprepared mind for a sight as such and it's seemingly impossibly open promising of things to come, I instead remained silent for an extra empty second to retain composure. Then I spoke, lifting his burden of anticipation and replacing it with a calm and settling sort of satisfaction that he was unfamiliar with, the sort of relief one might feel when finally handed the very thing desired for so very painfully long, but given freely without having to steal it away from another, unused and new. A quiet acceptance, followed by a peaceful feeling, and Seto was restlessly confused with the pleasantness of the emotions he was receiving from his clear and successful win. It seemed as though he was still waiting for an answer, perhaps it needed to be spoken aloud, this sort of moment could stand to be finalized.

"Of course I want to! So you swear, I'll never have to live anywhere else, ever again? And you won't throw me out?"

He shook his head slowly in agreement, and wore a quiet and still expression, pensive but halting with the threat of taking the happiness from my face, he couldn't do it, he couldn't tell me….

I could. I wanted this mess over with, as soon as possible. "Unless there's something that is very important that you should tell me first, before I accept. Important enough to make me wait another second after waiting as long as I have already….." I looked at him without mentally pushing or pulling, just expectantly interested in a chance to show him how I could help him, as he had helped me. He hesitated, and I heard his breathing pause as he drew in air to fill his lungs to capacity, and silently releasing the worry in his sigh, expelling some, but not all of the fear in his mind. Something that he could not put to rest and now was of dire importance to he and I both was in his mouth and waiting to be released. He was staring at me, and now that I was so much more matched to his face in my standing, he and I were watching each other evenly, he in discomfort and I in confusion. I began to think that maybe he was hiding something from me, had been, and now that he had come to admit this much to me he was stuck in one place, wanting for me to know, but terrified that I would be afraid, or upset, or for whatever reason. He had thought I might not accept it, and now I was dying to know what it could be. I wasn't going to leave, I knew that and he did as well, somewhere inside, or at least I hoped he knew. I never really said it, so, maybe it wasn't as obvious as I had once imagined. Well, he would know before this was all over, if it really was as big as I was imagining it might be at this point. I was terribly excited and wanted to know it and have it out, so I took an edging step to him, small and hesitant as if he might dash away like a wild animal. He wasn't so afraid, but he was thinking only of my response, how much rode on my acceptance of him as he was, as he couldn't help but be, and I saw it reflected in the deep shine in his eyes.

"Only one thing, but it's not the sort of thing that I'd want for you to be bothered with. Even so, I just feel as if I should tell you, so that I'm never an unwilling source of pain or fear for you. If you know, then perhaps you won't be afraid, I wouldn't ask you to stay with me if I thought you would be hurt somehow." He stopped momentarily, the plunge was just below him, hesitating for a swiftly stolen second that seemed to almost not even happen, a strange sort of smile broke out across his face and it was not unlike a look of possession of Seto by a kind and loving soul momentarily, but I saw it clearly in that second, and it was his smile. A warm and unregretful smile that felt the lifting of countless pounds worth of hiding something inside where I couldn't see, a task that was becoming more and more difficult by the day. But now, I would know, and even if I ran away from him, the shame and paranoia would be gone for good. He was free of a thing, for the first time in his life, and he had freed his own self.

"I have this thing inside me…..it's almost like there's someone else in here, along with me…..but not Seto. Another person entirely. I don't mean all the time, but there are times…every now and then…when I wake up, and I haven't even gone to sleep. And it will be later….I'll see the time and then I'll see it again a second later, and ten minutes will be gone. And I never remember anything, I never feel it coming, and I don't know how to trigger it. But I don't know what I say or do while I'm gone, but it's not me inside. It's not my feelings or my words….I can't do a thing to stop it, but it's not dangerous at all. I wouldn't ever put you in the way of danger. Do you believe me?"

Well, I had thought he was insane for a very long time before I knew any of this, but in all honesty he had explained away some of the things I had seen and pegged him for in the very beginning. His moods when in the presence of a challenging adversary in either verbal or physical confrontation, I had seen him in action in these types of situations, before we had become friends, and I had thought him rather obviously mentally 'lost at sea'. I hadn't ever been able to pinpoint what it was that tipped me off so assuredly, but it was most likely what he had just described to me now: the mood shift that would possess him so suddenly and cause him to laugh madly at nothing at all or to speak utter nonsense that was nothing but madness and dominance personified, in a moment of unadulterated intensity that was his shadow self in the flesh for a quickly spent second. And then just as quickly as it gripped him it would die in his throat, and he hadn't heard or felt a thing. I didn't say to him then that I had just always assumed he was crazy, since he seemed to be riding the entire acceptance or denial of the invitation on my first and true reaction. I blinked calmly and then without warning, I jumped suddenly so that he would not have time to escape, and I grabbed him in a tight and clingy hold with my arms flung around him in a blind second that he couldn't escape from, let alone return. He didn't try to, and just stood as he was, and allowed me free reign for a little while, accepting my approval and taking the motion to mean that I was sure that 'he was not crazy'. I let him think what he would, and just held on for the longest minute ever that I can remember being able to hold still, even while being so un-sober. He also never moved or thought to break the contact that either of us watched so carefully, so as not to abuse or overuse the newly acquired level of comfort. Instead, we just stayed in that place for a very long and pleasant moment, and we were both very glad to be done with the ordeal itself, and could now get on with the actual moving-in result that had been the whole purpose of this torturous and draw-out exposing of emotions.

And then in a strange and swiftly strangling moment, it was gone and he was pulling away, and I followed with my eyes to watch him, as I thought he might go back to his room. Our room, now, I thought with a grin that wasn't very noticeable to anyone but me. There would be no words from Seto, I guessed for perhaps quite awhile. I followed him in returned silence, as he turned to the bathroom and walked right through into the newly appointed place for me to live in. He picked up where he had last left off as though it had been a mere silence between friends, and with this new time and new place to belong, we would always be near one another, as long as we were both there and willing. And provided Seto was not at work or some other boring and relentlessly fun-ending responsibility that he was required to be in attendance for, and really too often. But otherwise, he and I spent the waking and sleeping moments in a state of being together that was broken only for the most crucial and briefest of moments. After a nearly spent week of this never-snapping thread of forever that he held me with, I lay awake beside him as he slept one night, and I thought about how amazing and seemingly infinitely blessed he must have been with his patience, to be able to be with me around the clock, and to see my face and hear my voice in a unstoppable and eternal circle that closed in on his life and work, and his personality surely. Was he truly not ill with the notion of my presence yet? If not, how much longer could he hold out? I never considered the possibility that his feelings were the same as mine, and the idea hadn't even crossed his mind, too full of simply me to be bothered with other notions. No, that couldn't be right……could it? I would have to find out, somehow, and I lifted my head which had been just previously aligned perfectly with his, on the same pillow and in the same way, only opposite so that we faced one another, and I watched his face to see the level of depth he slept at. He was still heavily dreaming, and I just couldn't wake him for such a hurtful reason, and instead decided to push the investigation back until he had woken more thoroughly. This was by far the bast tactic, I assumed, when asking a terrible load of emotionally saturated questions that were rooted in fear and lost amounts of sleep that grew to be quite large. Lying in the lonely night was a very bad area for thinking up questions, but it was so long ago, and I was so foolish still, but he was never angry with me for doubting him.

When he awoke many hours afterwards, I was so paranoid with the ideas of his losing interest in my presence, they had grown all night long, and were now so large and deeply set in worry that they all were impossible to even understand at that point. When Seto's eyes opened, they settled on me at once, and taking it in he smiled at his newfound and still-exiting ability to be able to see me first, before anything else could be seen in waking. Then afterwards, he shut his eyes once again and shifted slightly back into the pillow underneath our heads. He left his eyes shut but he didn't fall back into sleeping as of yet, but rather rested a few moments more before facing the real world outside of us. I waited and watched curiously at what he might do, I had never seen him wake up before this week, and I was even able to be distracted from sorrow to be taken again by curiosity as Seto woke up, in a very strange way. Which, all in all, I saw countless times afterwards, but on this waking it was still newer and still caught my attention at this time.

His eyelids were shut and then open at the same instant, and it seemed as though they had never been closed at all, of course they to could not open so fast, it would be a shock to gravity, even to time and space. Right after he was up he was also very nearly across the room, and all this before I could even call out to him. How did he find the will to throw himself at the world like that, and even with that iron force, how about the energy? If I ever even went to sleep at all, it was a brand new and even deeper cycle of addiction that had to be broken before I could even think about moving my body an inch in any direction. But now he was gone for real and the room was warm in his absence. I called to him to hear where he had gone to, although I knew inside that the cold presence was in the bathroom for a shower. I followed quickly and quietly opened the bathroom door, peering around it and searching for Seto. Finding him on the far side, in front of the mirror and none too happy with the reflection that menacingly loomed in response, I watched him with a grin, as he glared at the less-than-immaculate aura of both Seto Kaiba and his reflection upon awakening, still far too sleepy to notice the damage I saw, and I suppressed the laughter that nearly shot out across the bathroom. The mere sight of Seto as his disheveled and sleepy eyed state was bringing tears to my eyes, but the hair that had been slept upon…..

He turned for a moment and scowled at me in an awful way that was awfully funny in the same moment, and he finally heard me as the air escaped my throat at last, and my formerly hidden amusement was exposed, I couldn't help it any longer, laughing out loud at his desperation to stamp out the small but infuriating hair-rebellion just above his eyes. He was already losing this battle as soon as it began, pulling down on the strands of hair that used to fall across his eyes, but now fell slightly upwards, directly upwards as a matter of fact, to the ceiling, most likely with spite for the meticulous mind that lay within the hair above. He grumbled in a very frightening sort of way, already furious at the audacity of his own living, breathing body revolting against him so soon after waking. Quitting while he was still in his right mind, he let his hand fall to the bathroom sink and used the two hands placed beneath him to hold himself upright as he tried to wake up fully.

"Seto!….it's not so bad….Seto…? Heeey?" Silence followed for a still and thankfully single backed up moment, where his thought still came in motionless slides of sleepiness, and then a raspy kind sound came from out of the very place where Seto stood, but when I turned as fast as I could to see what had happened. Only Seto was there, just as before, and he was looking at me with annoyed attention, as if I had been the one to bother him. I thought quickly, staring at him emptyhanded for a few confusing and unsettling moments until one moment later, a frighteningly demonic voice came out of Seto and I recognized it immediately with a red face, drifting from the opposite end of the bathroom to where I still stood listening. It was the same sound that had unnerved me moments ago, it was Seto's voice….how frightening.

"…..Huh?" Seto clearly did not get it at all.

Not the morning sort, as I had recently come to discover, although everyone was 'not the morning sort' to me then, because I was not the sleeping sort, and couldn't really identify with a tired anything. Even so, his alternate _a.m.voice_ was a horribly death-tolling sound, especially since he was still incapable of hearing it's sound outside his head and luckily immune to himself in an audible sense.

After taking a few moments to right the wrongs in his appearance, Seto emerged from the bathroom and stood before me as I tried with all of my efforts not giggle directly in is face. But then, as I gazed at his expression which held patience for me still, even in this early hour, I remember the troubles of the night before, and the words that I felt slipped from my mouth almost unintentionally.

"Seto, aren't you tired of me by now? I've been trailing behind you constantly ever since I moved into this room with you…don't you hate me by now?"

I never wanted for him to agree with what I feared, but I asked him anyway, hoping that he could dissolve my fears with just a few well placed assurances and thus make the entire problem obsolete. However, as the words passed from my lips and into his mind, the entirety of his look shifted slightly, revealing nothing yet hinting at so much more within. Perhaps it was the weight that my worries held, or maybe he was just simply upset that I had received that impression in the first place. But no matter what it was that triggered it, Seto was gone, and here was someone I did not recognize. Fearing that what was transpiring was the very thing that Seto has forewarned about earlier that week, I tentatively reached out to him and spoke softly, begging him to quiet my whispering fears for the worst.

"Seto…? Did I say something wrong?"

He shocked me completely by slapping the hand I extended to him right out of his view and gave me a sickeningly sweet smirk, it was terrifying and intriguing to see but I knew that this was not a good place for me to be at the moment. I brought the hand that he had struck up to my chest, and I looked at him with a very injured expression, not wanting to anger him further but not knowing the first thing about this new and seemingly unsatisfied Seto. It was as if the pain that he had caused me moments ago brought him a strange satisfaction, and I froze where I was, hoping that maybe if I didn't move or speak, he would leave me and Seto alone. I was so afraid at that moment, but also I felt anger, a distaste for this other being that took hold of the boy that I loved and forced him to do things that I was sure the real Seto would never do. He had no right to control Seto and I lashed out at him verbally, intent on making it absolutely clear that his presence was unwanted.

"You aren't Seto, and you never will be! He hates you so much and now I do as well. Just leave him alone!" I yelled in his face so loud that my voice cracked and wavered slightly on the last few notes of rage I sent in his direction. He never moved at all, never flinched or raised an eyebrow at a word I had said, choosing instead to remain aloof and amused at my presence, and it seemed as if he hadn't heard a single word. Without any warning at all, he was suddenly within inches of my face, and I nearly fell over backwards in the rush of it all, seeing him move so quickly threw my own sense of balance into a tangled mess. He spoke quickly and precisely, meaning every single word of the statement, in a calculated move that I was sure was intended to drive me away from his host.

"You don't belong here with us. Leave, and never come back."

With those words in the air between us, he left me behind, walking purposefully out the door and shutting it quietly behind him, as if nothing at all had just happened. One tear trailed slowly across my cheek and fell from my chin, soundlessly making its mark on the carpet below my bare feet. I closed my eyes and held back a nearly audible sob, and I spoke to no one, because Seto was not there.

"I can never leave you now. You know as well as I do that I love you far too much. Don't you see it…?"

AN: And that is the last journey into this world. I hope that it helped explain a bit more of why things happened as they did, or maybe it was just a lot of fun to see Seto in the morning….hehe. You think he just wakes up like that? I think not….


End file.
